James Prescott Joule
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The physicist who showed that electrical energy, heat and mechanical work are the same quantity in different forms.
Establishing that energy is conserved across electrical, thermal and chemical processes is what makes a power budget possible: the watts that enter a device leave it as work and heat, and none of them disappear. Every cooling calculation in a data centre is his result applied at scale, and the reason a dense rack is a thermal problem before it is anything else. Joule heating is also why a bad connection warms up, which is one of the oldest diagnostic signs in the trade.
Also known as: joule, joule heating, mechanical equivalent of heat