Construction of the voltaic pile
- When
- 1800
- Where
- Volta's laboratory work, location not specified in sources
Volta stacked alternating copper or silver and zinc discs separated by brine-soaked cloth or cardboard to increase electromotive force.
In 1800 Volta stacked several pairs of alternating copper (or silver) and zinc discs serving as electrodes, separated by cloth or cardboard soaked in brine. This arrangement increased the total electromotive force of the device. The resulting pile was the first electrical battery that could continuously provide an electric current to a circuit, and Volta's contact tension theory held that the electromotive force driving the current occurred at the contact between the two metals.
Sources
- Voltaic pile Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-29
Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.