First photometer built in Collurania, with a photoelectric cell, with a cardan-suspended electrometer. The instrument consists of a cylindrical chamber to be inserted into the ocular end of the Cooke refractor. The operating principle is to transform light into something measurable: this is achieved by exploiting a physical property of alkali metals that emit a number of electrons proportional to the energy of the incident light, thus allowing an objective and precise measurement of the luminosity of the stars. and its variations.