Birth of James Clerk Maxwell

James Clerk Maxwell was born on 13 June 1831 in Edinburgh. A Scottish physicist born in Edinburgh, Maxwell formulated the classical theory of electromagnetism. In the 1860s he drew together the discoveries of Faraday and others into a set of equations showing that electric and magnetic fields travel as waves at the speed of light, which led him to conclude that light itself is an electromagnetic wave. He also contributed to the kinetic theory of gases and the statistical description of molecular speeds, and he produced the first colour photograph in 1861. He became the first Cavendish Professor of Physics at Cambridge. Einstein later said that his work changed the concept of reality in physics, and Maxwell died at 48.

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