Voltaic Pile

n 1799, Alessandro Volta developed a device that produced electricity using two different metals, called the voltaic pile. This was the first device that produced a continuous electric current - in other words, the first formal battery. Electricity from such batteries was used primarily in medicine and electrical study. The voltaic pile was improved upon quite rapidly, so that just 80 years later a book was printed describing nearly 100 different types of batteries. 

Alessandro Volta gained inspiration for this device when he repeated Luigi Galvani's "animal electricity" experiments. Galvani had observed that he could make a dead frog's leg twitch by touching a nerve with a metal scalpel while the frog rested on a metal lab table. Galvani concluded that the effect was due to electricity in the dead frog's body, which he called "animal electricity." Volta repeated Galvani's experiments and concluded that the source of electricity did not come from the frog, but rather from the contact of the two dissimilar metals (the scalpel and the lab table). The voltaic pile is made of two different metals, for example zinc and silver, separated by a cardboard- or paper-like material soaked in a weak acid, like vinegar. Comparing the voltaic pile to modern batteries, we see that the two metals are the two electrodes and the wet cardboard is the electrolyte. 

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