Welcome to Centro Volta!

[Lake Como Panorama]

You have reached the international web site of Centro di Cultura Scientifica Alessandro Volta (Centre for Scientific Culture Alessandro Volta, aka Centro Volta).

Centro Volta is a non-profit organization, created since 1983 by five Local Public Administrations and ten Universities in Lombardy Region, with the aim of providing scientists all over the world with a distinctive environment for fostering scientific communication, interaction and debate.

Headquartered on the Lake Como’s shores — one of the most beautiful areas in northern Italy, easily accessible from four international airports and characterized by a perfect blend of natural beauty, history, art and culture — the Center represents the ideal location to hold scientific conferences, seminars, workshops, summer schools and other scientific initiatives that require the availability of a charming and peaceful atmosphere, where creativity and exchange of ideas are to be favored and encouraged.

The Center organizes on average 30 events per year, attracting several thousands of scientists and researchers, working on a wide range of fields and disciplines.

The scientific program emerges as requests are received from Universities and Research Organizations around the world — either spontaneously or stimulated by the Center’s Scientific Board — giving rise to a diverse and multi-disciplinary work agenda specially conducive to fruitful interactions among researchers, possibly across fields’ boundaries.

This melting-pot effect also leads to the birth of new challenging endeavors and collaborations, as witnessed by the wealth of initiatives, activities, and projects currenlty undertaken by the Center.

If you are an Italian visitor, you may also want to check our Local Web Site, for national-level activities and initiatives

Highlights

Alessandro Volta

[Portrait of Alessandro Volta]

Alessandro Volta — of whom our Center is honored to bear the name — was an illustrious Italian physicist, born in Como on the 18th of February 1745. He is celebrated as a pioneer of electrical science, after whom the volt unit of electromotive force is named. In 1774 he was appointed professor of physics in the gymnasium of Como, and in 1777 he traveled through Switzerland, where he formed an intimate friendship with H. B. de Saussure. In 1779 a chair of physics was founded in Pavia, and Volta was chosen to occupy it. In 1782 he journeyed through France, Germany, Holland and England, and became acquainted with many scientific celebrities. In 1794 he received the Copley medal of the Royal Society. In 1799, as the result of a professional disagreement over the galvanic response advocated by Galvani, he invented the voltaic pile, an early electric battery which for the first time produced a steady electric current. In 1801 Napoleon Bonaparte called him to Paris, to show his experiments on contact electricity, and a medal was struck in his honor. When Napoleon later became Emperor, he appointed Volta as Senator of the newly constituted Kingdom of Italy (1809) and afterwards conferred on him the title of Count (1810). In 1815 the Austrian government made him Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy of Pavia. In 1819 he retired and settled in his native town, where he died on the 5th of March 1827.

Centro di Cultura Scientifica Alessandro Volta — P.IVA 01290630134 — C.F. 95004900130