Hertz's Discovery
Heinrich Hertz experimentally demonstrated the existence of electromagnetic waves, confirming James Clerk Maxwell's theoretical predictions in 1888.
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The statement of the theorem
Let and be the time-dependent vector fields representing the electric and magnetic fields, respectively, in a vacuum (). The propagation of these fields is governed by Maxwell's equations: \begin{enumerate} \item \nabla \cdot \mathbf{E} = 0 \\ \item \nabla \cdot \mathbf{B} = 0 \\ \item \nabla \times \mathbf{E} = - \frac{\partial \mathbf{B}}{\partial t} \\ \item \nabla \times \mathbf{B} = \mu_0 \epsilon_0 \frac{\partial \mathbf{E}}{\partial t} \end{enumerate} The existence of propagating waves is confirmed by the homogeneous wave equation derived from these relations: \begin{equation} \left( \nabla^2 - \frac{1}{c^2} \frac{\partial^2}{\partial t^2} \right) \mathbf{E} = 0 \end{equation} where is the speed of light, and must satisfy the Cauchy-Riemann conditions for wave propagation.
Source: Wikipedia