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Mach's Early Life
Born in Brno, Czechia on February 18, 1838, Ernst Walfried Josef Wenzel Mach would soon become a physicist and philosopher. He is most widely known for his contributions to physics with the study of shock waves. -
Shockwaves and Supersonic Speed
During a visit to Vienna, Ernst published his paper titled "Photographische Fixierung der durch Projektile in der Luft eingeleiten Vorgange" which discusses the supersonic flow and shock waves which he created with bullets moving at supersonic speed. He was able to capture this phenomenon using the shadowgraph imagine technique. -
Further Contributions
Mach, alongside his son Ludwig, were able to photograph the shadows of the invisible shock waves. They were able to discover the cone shape created by compression of air in front of a bullet when moving faster than the speed of sound. -
Mach's Principle
Mach also went on to discover that the inertia of a body can only be ascertained if there are other masses in the universe as a reference for measuring acceleration. Only the presence of other masses produces inertia.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPEwkMHRjZU -
Citations
Seeger, Raymond J. On Mach’s Curiosity about Shockwaves - Springer. link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-94-017-1462-4_4. Tietz, Tabea. “Ernst Mach and the Eponymous Mach Number.” SciHi Blog, 18 Feb. 2019, scihi.org/ernst-mach-physics-aerodynamics/.
Ernst Mach: Physicist and Philosopher, 1970, Volume 6