Magdeburg, Germany. Otto von Guericke’s scientific research, which made him famous during his lifetime and for which he is still remembered today, focused on the study of the properties of air and vacuum. He became famous for his invention, in 1650, of the first pneumatic pump for creating a vacuum and for his famous Magdeburg hemisphere experiment. The aim of the experiment was to demonstrate the enormous pressure exerted by atmospheric air on all bodies within it. To do this, in 1650 at the Imperial Diet in Regensburg, he constructed two bronze hemispheres that he fitted together; then, using a pump, he created a vacuum within them. The force that atmospheric pressure exerted on the two hemispheres was such that not even three pairs of horses could separate the two hemispheres; once the air was reintroduced, the two hemispheres separated on their own, effortlessly.
