The Peltier effect was an inadvertent discovery that Peltier made when he was investigating electricity. In an experiment that he would remember the rest of his life, Peltier joined copper wire and bismuth wire together and connected them to each other, then to a battery. When he switched the battery on, one of the junctions of the two wires got hot, while the other junction got cold. If the cold junction was put inside an insulated box, it became a low-efficiency refrigerator.

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