Rankine

William John Macquorn Rankine

Born: 2 July 1820 in Edinburgh, Scotland
Died: 24 Dec 1872 in Glasgow, Scotland

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Trained as a civil engineer, Rankine was appointed to the chair of civil engineering and mechanics at Glasgow in 1855. He developed methods to solve the force distribution in frame structures.

He worked on heat, and attempted to derive Sadi Carnot's law from his own hypothesis. His work was extended by Maxwell. Rankine also wrote on fatigue in the metal of railway axles, on Earth pressures in soil mechanics and the stability of walls. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1853.

Among his most important works are Manual of Applied Mechanics (1858), Manual of the Steam Engine and Other Prime Movers (1859) and On the Thermodynamic Theory of Waves of Finite Longitudinal Disturbance .

References:

  1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography
  2. Biography in Encyclopaedia Britannica
  3. William John Macquorn Rankine, Proc. Roy. Soc. London 21 (1873), 1-4.
  4. L D B Gordon, William John Macquorn Rankine, Proc. Roy. Soc. Edinburgh 8 (1875), 296-306.
  5. J B Henderson, Macquorn Rankine : professor of civil engineering and mechanics in the University of Glasgow, 1855 to 1872 : an oration (Glasgow, 1932).
  6. D E Channell, Rankine : William John Macquorn Rankine (Edinburgh, 1986).
  7. H B Sutherland, Rankine : his life and times : lecture delivered before the British Geotechnical Society at the University of Glasgow on 13 December 1972 to mark the centenary of the death on 24 December 1872 of William John Macquorn Rankine (London, 1973). 
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JOC/EFR February 1996