Rudolf Clausius publishes his paper on the…
1850 CE
Clausius's PhD thesis concerning the refraction of light proposed that we see a blue sky during the day, and various shades of red at sunrise and sunset (among other phenomena) due to reflection and refraction of light.
Later, Lord Rayleigh will show that it is in fact due to the scattering of light, but regardless, Clausius uses a far more mathematical approach than some have used.
His most famous paper, Ueber die bewegende Kraft der Wärme ("On the Moving Force of Heat and the Laws of Heat which may be Deduced Therefrom") is published in 1850, and deals with the mechanical theory of heat.
In this paper, he shows that there is a contradiction between Carnot's principle and the concept of conservation of energy.
Clausius restates the two laws of thermodynamics to overcome this contradiction (the third law will be developed by Walther Nernst, during the years 1906–1912).
This paper makes him famous among scientists.
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