Torricelli Experiment
Torricelli performed his celebrated experiment
on argento vivo (quicksilver) i.e mercury in ……………………. in Spring 1644. Torricelli filled a glass tube open on one
end with ………………………. Then closing off the
open end with a finger he tipped the ..…………. upside down and lowered it into
another basin containing more mercury.
He observed that the column of mercury…………………………. only partially stopping
at a height of about ………. cm. Toricelli
was convinced that the space created by the descent of the mercury in the tube
was …………………, and that the force holding up the column consisted of the ………………… exerted
by the…….. on the mercury in the
basin. In a letter to Michelangelo Ricci
June the 11th 1644 Torricelli declared that his ………………………. proved 2
fundamental concepts; 1st that nature did not abhor the void 2nd
that air had ……………….. The results of the
mercury experiment opened a period of………………………….. change, forcing a
re-examination of doctrine accepted for ………………………...
