- James Prescott Joule -
- Born: 1818 Died 1889 -

Joule's career in the sciences began quite early in his life. As early as 16, Prescott was under the tutelage of James Dalton. His experiments soon followed in a laboratory he built in his family's basement. By this time, many scientists had begun hypothesizing on the interrelationships between heat, electricity, and magnetism - and by the 1840's Joule had formulated not only the well known "Joule's Law" but also a principle for conservation of energy. In the 1850's, Joule worked together with another scientist to come up with the "Joule-Thomson effect".

Possibly his most well-known experiment is his "Paddle wheel" experiment, which led to an understanding of the conversion of energy from one form to another.
His experimentations were not limited to simply those bounded in the areas of physics. Joule was an inventor as well - his accomplishments included the "arc" welding process and a displacement pump.
As with every scientist, there is a list of Joule's failures. He attempted to design a motor that would provide infinite power but after many failed attempts realized it was unobtainable.