Aldo Pontremoli

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Aldo Pontremoli (19 January 1896 – 25 May 1928) was an Italian physicist who became a professor of theoretical physics at the University of Milan in 1926 and who led the Institute of Advanced Physics there from 1924 until his disappearance in 1928.

Early life and education
Pontremoli was born in Milan. He studied at a Milanese high school, where Temistocle Calzecchi-Onesti was one of his teachers. He spent two years at Politecnico di Milano and then studied physics at La Sapienza University in Rome. His studies were interrupted by World War I, in which he served and earned the Silver Medal of Military Valor and the Croce di Guerra. As a child, he and his cousin Mario Pontremoli started a company named A. Pontremoli e Associati.

Academic career
After graduating in 1920, Pontremoli worked as an assistant to professor Orso Mario Corbino. He won a scholarship to study at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, where he worked under Ernest Rutherford. In 1924 he founded the Institute of Advanced Physics at the University of Milan, and he led it until his disappearance. He became the University of Milan’s chair of theoretical physics in 1926. His research covered theoretical physics, optics, nuclear physics and hydrodynamics. After his disappearance, Giovanni Polvani succeeded him in the chair.

Arctic expedition and disappearance
In 1928 Pontremoli joined General Umberto Nobile’s airship Italia expedition to the Arctic, along with František Běhounek. He helped take measurements of the Earth’s magnetic field and cosmic rays, but most data were lost after the crash. On 25 May 1928, as the airship tried to return to base near Ny-Ålesund, Nordaustlandet, Svalbard, it crash-landed on the ice. Pontremoli was seen alive inside the airship envelope after the crash, but the envelope drifted away with him and five others. No trace of the airship or its crew was ever found.