A hygrometer is an instrument that measures humidity, the amount of water vapor present in the air, historically by measuring related properties such as the expansion of a moisture-sensitive material. Leonardo da Vinci built a prototype hygrometer around 1480, and the Italian physician Francesco Folli and the English scientist Robert Hooke made practical improvements to humidity-measuring instruments in the 17th century. The Swiss scientist Horace Benedict de Saussure invented the hair-tension hygrometer in 1783, using the expansion and contraction of a strand of human hair as its sensing element, a design that dominated humidity measurement for over a century.
Facts
YearSourced to the subject's own account SignificanceSourced to the subject's own accountDa Vinci's prototype used a balance to weigh a wool ball that absorbed moisture from the air; the design saw its major practical refinements in the 1600s from Francesco Folli and Robert Hooke. 1 Connections
In Field
Source Hygrometer (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. Hygrometer (Wikipedia)
WikipediaClassical hygrometer section
Major improvements occurred during the 1600s; Francesco Folli invented a more practical version of the device, and Robert Hooke improved a number of meteorological devices, including the hygrometer.
In Field: Mechanical Engineering, Lead section
Humidity measurement instruments usually rely on measurements of some other quantities, such as temperature, pressure, mass, and mechanical or electrical changes in a substance as moisture is absorbed.
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