Download Christian Andreas Doppler e the man and his

Eur J Echocardiography (2005) 6, 7e10
HISTORICAL NOTE
Christian Andreas Doppler e the man
and his legacy
I.M. Coman)
Iliescu Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases, 258 Fundeni Way, sect. 2, 022328 Bucharest, Romania
Received 17 March 2004; received in revised form 19 May 2004; accepted 2 June 2004
KEYWORDS
C.A. Doppler;
Doppler effect;
Medical applications
Abstract Aims Reminding the life and legacy of the Austrian scientist who discovered the famous ‘Doppler Effect’.
Methods and results C.A. Doppler was born the 29th of November 1803 in Salzburg. After studies in Linz and Vienna, he graduated in mathematics, became assistant at the University and later worked as professor in Prague. Back to Vienna, he
was appointed as professor at the Polytechnic School anddin 1850das first director
of the new Institute of Physics. C.A. Doppler did publish on magnetism, electricity,
optics and astronomy.
He remains in the history of science mainly due to the discovery presented (May
25, 1842) at the Royal Bohemian Society of Science entitled ‘‘On the colored light of
the double stars and certain other stars of the heavens’’; the paper described (applied to light) the shift of frequency which bears nowadays his name. The theory
was later experimentally proven anddextended for any electromagnetic and
acoustic wavesdgot miriads of applications in astronomy, physics, aviation, meteorology and health science. Satomura in Japan (1955) published it’s first ultrasound
vascular applicationdwith successive achievements in the next decades.
Conclusion Doppler ultrasonography became the main noninvasive instrument for
functional assessment of heart and vessels.
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Introduction
The Austrian scientist who developed the famous
‘Doppler Effect’ was recently celebrated, during
the Euroecho 7 meeting in Barcelona. It was a reminder to the memory of a surprising physician
who’s brightest idea linksd160 years after being
) Tel./fax: D40-21-240-2224.
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doi:10.1016/j.euje.2004.06.004
publisheddsuch different areas as astronomy,
spectroscopy, meteorology and health science.
Walking through old Salzburg, one can discover,
not far from the river, in Makart Platz, a fine baroque building anddon its wallda short notice
reminding the birth of Christian Andreas Doppler
(Fig. 1). For most of the academic world, the
man is known as a physicist; but you can equally
find him on lists of mathematicians or astronomers
too; ‘the confusion’ is a proof for the exceptional
broad spectrum of application of his main discovery.
8
I.M. Coman
Figure 1
His life
Christian Andreas Doppler was born in Salzburg,
Austria, the 29th of November 1803 (Fig. 2).1,2
His ancestors were stonemasons anddaccording
to the tradition of those times, he had to take
over the family’s business. It was just his poor
health deciding the parents to accept another career. Doppler attended primary school in Salzburg
and secondary school in Linz (Upper Austria). In
1822, advised by some of his teachers, he
Figure 2
C. Doppler’s birthplace in Salzburg.
C.A. Doppler.
began to study mathematics at the new Vienna
Polytechnic Institute, graduating in 1825. A short
break (with philosophy lectures attended at the
Salzburg Lyceum) was followed by 2 more years
of higher mathematics, mechanics and astronomy
at the University of Vienna. It was here that
he was appointed assistant to Professor A. Burg
in 1829 and that was the moment of his first
original paper (‘A contribution to the theory of
parallels’).
Unfortunately, his assistantship in Vienna was
only temporary and the worst time of his youth
(with months of unemployment and work as bookkeeper at a cotton factory) followed. Emigration
to America seemed the solution (and he even visited
the American Consulate in Munich to make preliminary arrangements). The USA lost a future citizen
just because he was finally accepted as professor
at the Technical Secondary School in Prague and
later (1837) at the Polytechnic School, of the same
city.
It is during this Vienna staying that Doppler married and his numerous family (including three sons
and two daughters) will bedthrough yearsdthe
final result.
The stay of C. Doppler in Bohemia ended in
1848. With a short stop at the Academy of Mines
and Forests in Banska Stiavnica, Doppler’s family
rejoined Vienna, where he became professor at
the Polytechnic School, in 1849. One year later,
he was appointeddon 17th of January 1850das
the first director of the new Institute of Physics
in Viennadthe highest point of his administrative
career.
Unhappily, health problems followed shortly
thereafter (lung diseasedprobably tuberculosis);
he had to move to an area with better climate
but, despite medical care, he died in Venice on
March 17, 1853.
C.A. Doppler e the man and his legacy
9
His work
His legacy
During his lifetime, the man was quite controversial: a personality praised by some, but detested
by others; and even as a scientist, he had a difficult
time until being finally accepted for his brilliant
ideas. C.A. Doppler did publish on magnetism,
electricity, optics and astronomical topics, but
for sure, the discovery that allowed him to remain
in the history of science was the one he presented
on the 25th of May 1842 at the Royal Bohemian
Society of Science.
The paper was called: ‘‘Über das farbige Licht
der Doppelsterne und einiger anderer Gestirne
des Himmels’’ (‘‘On the colored light of the double
stars and certain other stars of the heavens’’) and
it described (applied to light) the shift of frequency which is nowadays known as ‘Doppler
effect’.3 It was not a perfect demonstration and
the chosen example was wrong (the effect is too
small to be significant for the colours of the stars).
In spite of this, as Bolzano wrote ‘‘one can see the
germ of some important future discovery there,
even though the idea as presented by Doppler is
basically incorrect’’.
In 1846 Doppler published a better version of his
principle where he considered both the motion of
the source and the motion of the observer. Proof
that Doppler’s theory was right was brought by
the Dutch mathematician Ch. H. D. Buys Ballot
(1817e1890) during a well known ‘train station experiment’ (1845). Doppler shift is in fact valid for
any electromagnetic ( gamma, X-ray, ultraviolet,
light, infrared, microwaves and RF signals) and
acoustic waves (infrasound, sound and ultrasound).4
The life of C. Doppler‘s ideas is much longer
than his own lifedand the next 160 years showed
an increasingly broader band of (often unexpected) applications of his works.5
After Fizeau generalized the application of Doppler’s principle to light, astronomical studies have
been decisively influenced. Relativistic form of the
Doppler shift ( for objects travelling very fast) and
Lorenz contraction correction allowed to approximate the speed of the Universe expansion and to
define the ‘big bang’ timing. Extrasolar planet
detection became possible: the planet tugs its star
in a slight elliptical motion, which can be detected
using the Doppler shift of the starlight.6
At the other edge, at the microcosmic level, for
atomic spectra in the visible and ultraviolet light,
Doppler broadening often sets the limit on resolution of spectroscopy. With the thermal motion, the
atoms traveling toward the detector will have
transition frequencies, which differ from those of
atoms at rest by the Doppler shift. The distribution
of velocities can be derived from the Boltzmann
distribution.7
RADARS (radio detection and ranging)dfirst introduced by Robert Watson-Watt in 1935, use radio
waves shift from moving reflecting/scattering atmospheric targetsdas different as low-earth-orbit
(LEO) satellites, airplanes (aviation radars) or rain
drops (weather radars). Radio direction finding
systems and SAR (synthetic-aperture radar)d
side-looking imaging systemsdrely on the same
effect, while police radars use mainly microwave
deflection for speed control.
The ‘Doppler galaxy’ of our times includes the
names of commercial companies, rock groups,
hometown streets and even of a lunar crater, baptized in honor of the Austrian physicist.
First ultrasound medical application (Dusik
1942) and first cardiac one (Edler 1953) were quite
rapidly followed by the use of Doppler effect for
flow characterization.8
Shigeo Satomura and Yasuhara Nimura at the
Institute of Scientific and Industrial Research in
Osaka, Japan (beginning with 1955) used it for the
study of cardiac valvular motion and pulsations of
peripheral blood vessels.9 A couple of years later,
a Seattle-based pediatrician (R. Rushmer) assisted
by a group of engineers (including D. Franklin,
D. Ellis and Donald Baker) pioneered transcutaneous continuous-wave flow measurements and spectral analysis in peripheral and extracranial brain
vessels (1958). Actually, with the introduction
of pulse-Doppler (Baker-1970), transcranial continuous Doppler (Rune Aaslid-1982), color-Doppler,
power-Doppler, tissue-Doppler imaging and many
other developments, Doppler ultrasonography
became e for decades e the main non-invasive
His vision
In 1846, C.A. Doppler wrote: ‘‘It is almost to be accepted with certainty that this (his theory) willdin
the not too distant futuredoffer astronomers
a welcome means to determine the movements
and distances of such stars’’.
Doppler could not have imagined the revolutionary effect of his discovery in various areas of
human interest. We owe a lot to this man, whose
19th century work hasdso surprisinglyddeeply
influenced present day cardiology.
10
instrument for functional assessment of heart and
vessels.
References
1. Grössing H, Kadletz K (Band 1), Schuster P (Band 2). Christian
Doppler (1803e1853). Vienna: Böhlau Verlag; 1992.
2. Eden A. The Search for Christian Doppler. Vienna: SpringerVerlag; 1992.
3. Doppler CA. Über das farbige Licht der Doppelsterne und
einiger anderer Gestirne des Himmels. Abh Königl Böhm Ges
Wiss 1843;2:465e82.
I.M. Coman
4. Filkin D, Hawking S. Stephen Hawking’s Universe: The
Cosmos Explained. New York: Basic Books; 1997.
5. Heilbron JL, editor. Oxford Companion to the History of
Modern Science. New York: Oxford University Press; 2003.
6. Hearnshaw JB. Doppler and Vogeldtwo notable anniversaries in stellar astronomy. Vistas Astronomy 1992;35:
157e77.
7. Ohanian HC. Physics (2nd ed. expanded). WW Norton & Co.;
1989.
8. Dussik KT. Uber die moglichkeit hochfrequente mechanische
schwingungen als diagnostisches hilfsmittel zu verwerten.
Z Neurol Psychiat 1942;174:153.
9. Satomura S. Ultrasonic Doppler method for the inspection of
cardiac function. J Acoust Soc Am 1957;29:1181e5.