Michael Faraday ( 1791 - 1867 )

Birth: Newington Butts, Surrey, England (22 September 1791) Death: Hampton Court, Middlesex (25 August 1867) Burial: Highgate Cemetery, London Research Field: Chemistry, physics Education: DCL (1832) Career: Apprenticed to a bookbinder (c 1804); assistant to Sir Humphry Davy at the Royal Institution; visited the Continent with Davy; succeeded Davy at Royal Institution (1827); granted pension (1835); advisor to Trinity House (1836, for nearly 30 years) given house at Hampton Court (1858); discoveries included induced electricity (1831), electronic state of matter (1831) & equivalents in electro-chemical decomposition (1834) Often called the first scientific celebrity in Britain, Faraday was the leading scientst of his generation. his work in the fields of electricity and magnetism led to the discovery of electromagnetic rotation - the theoretical basis of the electric motor.