This section is from "The American Cyclopaedia", by George Ripley And Charles A. Dana. Also available from Amazon: The New American Cyclopędia. 16 volumes complete..
Alacedouio Mellom, an Italian physicist, born in Parma in 1801, died in Portici, near Naples, Aug. 11, 1853. He was professor of natural philosophy in the university of Parma from 1824 to 1831, when political events compelled him to take refuge in France. Through the efforts of Arago he was appointed a professor in the college of Dole, in the department of the Jura. Going thence to Geneva, he availed himself of the scientific instruments of Prevost and De la Rive to make several important discoveries respecting the radiation of heat, which he presented in 1833 to the French academy of sciences. His communication was received coldly, but the discoveries which it embraced subsequently procured him the Rumford medal from the royal society of London. He was enabled through the influence of Arago and Humboldt to return to Italy, and in 1839 was appointed director of the meteorological observatory then building on Mt. Vesuvius. There he made the discovery of heat in lunar light, which led to the determination of the analogy of radiant heat to light.
For his presumed sympathy with liberal principles he was ejected from his post in 1849, and retired to a villa near Portici. In 1850 he published the first volume of La termocrasi, o la colorazione ca-lorifica, containing an account of his theory of the "coloration of light," and of his experiments on the diffusion of heat by radiation, and particularly of its transmission through transparent media. A month before his death he communicated to A. de la Rive the result of his researches in electrical induction.
 
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