Resistance Thermometry

THE temperature coefficient of electrical resistance of pure metals is high and therefore the resistance increases rapidly with rising temperature. In 1871, Siemens suggested the use of this property as an accurate means of temperature determination. Owing to practical difficulties, particularly the contamination of the metal and consequent permanent change in its resistance and its resistance-temperature relation, this method fell into disrepute as a practical standard until revived later by Callendar and Griffiths, and subsequently by Holborn and Wien, all of whom showed that the earlier difficulties were not inherent in the method but incident to the mode of protection of the resistance coils. Following .the work of these investigators, the problem of temperature measurement by this means has been the subject of careful study and has now assumed an importance second only in practical adoption to the thermo-electric method. It is generally recognized, both here and in Europe, that the standard temperature scale should be the thermodynamic as it permits the evaluation of high temperatures on the basis of the radiation laws of Stefan and Bolzmann, of Rayleigh, and of Wien and Planck, on a scale consistent with that obtained by means of the gas thermometer at low temperatures. Lord Kelvin showed that only. a very small correction, amounting to about +0.7° at 1000° C.-almost within the limits of experimental errors-is necessary to adjust the constant-volume nitrogen thermometer to the ideal thermodynamic scale.