New Google Doodle Honors Alessandro Volta, Forefather of the modern Battery

Google’s latest doodle celebrates the birthday of Alessandro Volta, who invented an early form of the electrical battery in 1799. Volta’s invention consisted of discs of various metals, together with copper and Zn, separated by cardboard that had been soaked in brine.

Born in 1745 within the city of Como in what's currently northern Italy, Volta was the son of a nobleman. He became a prof of physics in 1774 at Como’s Royal college before going on to figure on the event of the “electrophorus”, a tool that made electricity. Volta’s invention was the result of a professional competition with Luigi Galvani. 

His voltaic pile, an early battery that made a steady current, was developed in 1800 at a time once competitory theories existed regarding concerning electricity was generated. One theory, popularised by luigi galvani, was that there was a special electricity in animals, that he demonstrated by connecting 2 totally different metals with a frog’s leg.

Galvani believed the frogs’ muscles generated the electricity, whereas Volta thought the tissue was only a conductor.

The debate galvanized Volta to experiment with conductivity (often on his own tongue). Eventually, Volta put together a stack of metal disks, and once metal wires were connected to each ends of the stack, an electrical current flowed through the pile, proving that tissue wasn't necessary to come up with an electrical current.

Volta came to the conclusion that it absolutely was the liquid within the frog’s leg that was necessary instead of the frog itself. An equivalent result was achieved once he replaced the leg with paper soaked in brine.

After being made a count in 1810 by Napoleon, Volta retired in 1819 to his estate in Camnago, where he died in 1827.

The Google Doodle honors Volta’s discovery with an animated battery that's paying homage to both a voltaic pile and a battery-life reminder on a modern smartphone.