Education
Leiden University.
physicist university professor
Leiden University.
Rijke spent his scientific career exploring the physics of electricity, and is known for the Rijke tube. Rijke was born in Hemmen, (now Overbetuwe municipality), Gelderland. His father, Dirk Rijke, was a pastor.
His mother was Elisabeth Pieternella Beausar.
From 1830 Rijke studied physics under Pieter Johannes Uijlenbroek at the University of Leiden, where he obtained his Doctor of Philosophy in 1836. The title of his Doctor of Philosophy thesis was "De origine electricitatis Voltaicae".
In 1835 he was appointed professor of physics at the Royal Athenaeum in Maastricht. In 1845 he became extraordinary professor and in 1854 he was promoted to full professor of physics at the University of Leiden.
There he started a physics laboratory with a large collection of scientific instruments.
His most important students were H.A. Lorentz and Juris Doctor van der Waals. He retired in 1882, and was succeeded by Heike Kamerlingh Onnes as professor of experimental physics at the University of Leiden.