thermometer, instrument for measuring the temperature of a system.

Temperature measurement is
important to a wide range of activities, including manufacturing, scientific research, and medical
practice.

The invention of the thermometer is generally credited to the Italian mathematician-physicist Galileo
Galilei. In his instrument, built about 1592, the changing temperature of an inverted glass vessel
produced an expansion or contraction of the air within it, which in turn changed the level of the liquid
with which the vessel’s long, open-mouthed neck was partially filled. This general principle was
perfected in succeeding years by experimenting with liquids such as mercury and by providing a scale to
measure the expansion and contraction brought about in such liquids by rising and falling temperatures.

By the early 18th century as many as 35 different temperature scales had been devised. The German
physicist Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit in 1700–30 produced accurate mercury thermometers calibrated to a
standard scale that ranged from 32°, the melting point of ice, to 96° for body temperature. The unit of
temperature (degree) on the Fahrenheit temperature scale is 1/180 of the difference between the
boiling (212°) and freezing points of water. The first centigrade scale (made up of 100 degrees) is
attributed to the Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius, who developed it in 1742. Celsius used 0° for
the boiling point of water and 100° for the melting point of snow. This was later inverted to put 0° on the
cold end and 100° on the hot end, and in that form it gained widespread use. It was known simply as the
centigrade scale until in 1948 the name was changed to the Celsius temperature scale. In 1848 the
British physicist William Thomson (later Lord Kelvin) proposed a system that used the degree Celsius but
was keyed to absolute zero (−273.15 °C); the unit of this scale is now known as the kelvin. The Rankine
scale (see William Rankine) employs the Fahrenheit degree keyed to absolute zero (−459.67 °F).

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Any substance that somehow changes with alterations in its temperature can be used as the basic
component in a thermometer. Gas thermometers work best at very low temperatures. Liquid
thermometers were once the most common type in use. They were simple, inexpensive, long-lasting,
and able to measure a wide temperature span. The liquid was almost always mercury or coloured
alcohol, sealed in a glass tube with a gas like nitrogen or argon making up the rest of the volume of the
tube. In the early 21st century, mercury thermometers were supplanted by electronic digital
thermometers, which were more accurate and did not contain toxic mercury. Digital thermometers use
a thermistor, a resistor with a resistance that varies with temperature. To measure body temperature,
infrared thermometers that focus infrared light onto a detector that measures the amount of light
received and convert the electrical signal produced by the detector into a temperature were also used.

Electrical-resistance thermometers characteristically use platinum and, like thermistors, operate on the
principle that electrical resistance varies with changes in temperature. However, they can measure a
much greater temperature range than thermistors. Thermocouples are among the most widely used
industrial thermometers. They are composed of two wires made of different materials joined together at
one end and connected to a voltage-measuring device at the other. A temperature difference between
the two ends creates a voltage that can be measured and translated into a measure of the temperature
of the junction end. The bimetallic strip constitutes one of the most trouble-free and durable
thermometers. It is simply two strips of different metals bonded together and held at one end. When
heated, the two strips expand at different rates, resulting in a bending effect that is used to measure the
temperature change. Thermostats formerly used bimetallic strips as temperature sensors, but modern
digital thermostats use thermistors.

Other thermometers operate by sensing sound waves or magnetic conditions associated with
temperature changes. Magnetic thermometers increase in efficiency as temperature decreases, which
makes them extremely useful in measuring very low temperatures with precision. Temperatures can also
be mapped, using a technique called thermography that provides a graphic or visual representation of
the temperature conditions on the surface of an object or land area.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by Erik
Gregersen.

temperature

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thermometer Most modern thermometers are graduated with both the Celsius temperature scale and
the Fahrenheit temperature scale. This thermometer's inner scale shows degrees Fahrenheit, and its
outer scale shows degrees Celsius.(more)

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The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Last Updated: Mar 14, 2025 • Article History

Key People:

George Dollond

Percy Williams Bridgman

Sir C. Wyville Thomson

H.L. Callendar

Guillaume Amontons

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temperature, measure of hotness or coldness expressed in terms of any of several arbitrary scales and
indicating the direction in which heat energy will spontaneously flow—i.e., from a hotter body (one at a
higher temperature) to a colder body (one at a lower temperature). Temperature is not the equivalent of
the energy of a thermodynamic system; e.g., a burning match is at a much higher temperature than
an iceberg, but the total heat energy contained in an iceberg is much greater than the energy contained
in a match. Temperature, similar to pressure or density, is called an intensive property—one that is
independent of the quantity of matter being considered—as distinguished from extensive properties,
such as mass or volume.

temperature scalesStandard and absolute temperature scales.

Three temperature scales are in general use today. The Fahrenheit (°F) temperature scale is used in
the United States and a few other English-speaking countries. The Celsius (°C) temperature scale is
standard in virtually all countries that have adopted the metric system of measurement, and it is widely
used in the sciences. The Kelvin (K) scale, an absolute temperature scale (obtained by shifting the Celsius
scale by −273.15° so that absolute zero coincides with 0 K), is recognized as the international standard
for scientific temperature measurement.

In certain fields of engineering, another absolute temperature scale, the Rankine scale (see William
Rankine), is preferred over the Kelvin scale. Its unit of measure—the degree Rankine (°R)—equals the
Fahrenheit degree, as the kelvin equals one Celsius degree.

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The Réaumur (°Re) temperature scale (or octogesimal division) was widely used in parts of Europe in the
18th and 19th centuries; it later was used primarily to measure the temperature of mixtures during
brewing, of syrups in the production of certain food products, and of milk during cheese making.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Encyclopaedia Britannica.

heat

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 Introduction

 Heat as a form of energy

 Heat transfer

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Henry Cavendish

Sir Benjamin Thompson, count von Rumford

James Prescott Joule

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heat, energy that is transferred from one body to another as the result of a difference in temperature. If
two bodies at different temperatures are brought together, energy is transferred—i.e., heat flows—from
the hotter body to the colder. The effect of this transfer of energy usually, but not always, is an increase
in the temperature of the colder body and a decrease in the temperature of the hotter body. A
substance may absorb heat without an increase in temperature by changing from one physical state
(or phase) to another, as from a solid to a liquid (melting), from a solid to a vapour (sublimation), from a
liquid to a vapour (boiling), or from one solid form to another (usually called a crystalline transition). The
important distinction between heat and temperature (heat being a form of energy and temperature a
measure of the amount of that energy present in a body) was clarified during the 18th and 19th
centuries.

Heat as a form of energy

How heat transfers from one object to anotherLearn about heat transfer and the relationship between
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Because all of the many forms of energy, including heat, can be converted into work, amounts of energy
are expressed in units of work, such as joules, foot-pounds, kilowatt-hours, or calories. Exact
relationships exist between the amounts of heat added to or removed from a body and the magnitude
of the effects on the state of the body. The two units of heat most commonly used are the calorie and
the British thermal unit (BTU). The calorie (or gram-calorie) is the amount of energy required to raise the
temperature of one gram of water from 14.5 to 15.5 °C; the BTU is the amount of energy required to
raise the temperature of one pound of water from 63 to 64 °F. One BTU is approximately 252 calories.
Both definitions specify that the temperature changes are to be measured at a constant pressure of one
atmosphere, because the amounts of energy involved depend in part on pressure. The calorie used in
measuring the energy content of foods is the large calorie, or kilogram-calorie, equal to 1,000 gram-
calories.

In general, the amount of energy required to raise a unit mass of a substance through a specified
temperature interval is called the heat capacity, or the specific heat, of that substance. The quantity of
energy necessary to raise the temperature of a body one degree varies depending upon
the restraints imposed. If heat is added to a gas confined at constant volume, the amount of heat
needed to cause a one-degree temperature rise is less than if the heat is added to the same gas free to
expand (as in a cylinder fitted with a movable piston) and so do work. In the first case, all the energy
goes into raising the temperature of the gas, but in the second case, the energy not only contributes to
the temperature increase of the gas but also provides the energy necessary for the work done by the gas
on the piston. Consequently, the specific heat of a substance depends on these conditions. The most
commonly determined specific heats are the specific heat at constant volume and the specific heat at
constant pressure. The heat capacities of many solid elements were shown to be closely related to
their atomic weights by the French scientists Pierre-Louis Dulong and Alexis-Thérèse Petit in 1819. The
so-called law of Dulong and Petit was useful in determining the atomic weights of certain metallic
elements, but there are many exceptions to it; the deviations were later found to be explainable on the
basis of quantum mechanics.

It is incorrect to speak of the heat in a body, because heat is restricted to energy being transferred.
Energy stored in a body is not heat (nor is it work, as work is also energy in transit). It is customary,
however, to speak of sensible and latent heat. The latent heat, also called the heat of vaporization, is the
amount of energy necessary to change a liquid to a vapour at constant temperature and pressure. The
energy required to melt a solid to a liquid is called the heat of fusion, and the heat of sublimation is the
energy necessary to change a solid directly to a vapour, these changes also taking place under conditions
of constant temperature and pressure.

Air is a mixture of gases and water vapour, and it is possible for the water present in the air to change
phase; i.e., it may become liquid (rain) or solid (snow). To distinguish between the energy associated
with the phase change (the latent heat) and the energy required for a temperature change, the concept
of sensible heat was introduced. In a mixture of water vapour and air, the sensible heat is the energy
necessary to produce a particular temperature change excluding any energy required for a phase
change.