National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Morse Telegraph 1844
The man most commonly associated with the telegraph, Samuel Morse, did not invent the communications tool. But he developed it, commercialized it and invented the famous code for it that bears his name.
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Magnet Academy: Marconi Radio 1897
A number of distinguished scientists had a hand in the discovery of "wireless telegraphy," but it was the work done by Guglielmo Marconi that is credited with providing the basis of radio as we know it today.
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Magnetron 1920
Although they have applications at the highest levels of scientific research, magnetron tubes are used every day by non-scientists who just want to heat their food in a hurry.
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Schweigger Multiplier 1820
Spurred by Hans Christian Orsted's discovery of a relationship between electricity and magnetism, German chemist Julian Schweigger immediately began tinkering and soon came up with a very early galvanometer known as the Schweigger...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Voltaic Pile 1800
For thousands of years, electricity was an ephemeral phenomenon- there one second and gone the next. The voltaic pile changed that forever.
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: The Tesla Coil
What's behind the cool purple sparks? Neat science about resonance and transformers. Slideshow: [6:00]
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Tesla Coil 1891
By the late 1800s, electricity had long been discovered and was no longer considered a novelty. The science of how to store, enhance, or transmit electrical current was just beginning to evolve, and eccentric scientist Nikola Tesla...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Transatlantic Telegraph Cable 1858
The main figure behind the first transatlantic telegraph knew very little about the science or engineering behind it, but was convinced that with it a fortune could be made. Read about these findings here.
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Magnet Academy: Sulfur Globe 1660
In the 17th century, German scientist Otto von Guericke built and carried out experiments with a sulfur globe that produced static electricity.
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Magnet Academy: Steam Condensing Engine 1769
Few inventions have affected human history as much as the steam engine. Without it, there would have been no locomotives, no steamers and no Industrial Revolution.
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Stanley Transformer 1886
Applying discoveries Michael Faraday had made a few decades earlier, William Stanley designed the first commercial transformer for Westinghouse in 1886.
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Smoothing Iron 1882
Although not as celebrated as many other scientific inventions, the smoothing iron has its own rich history of development stretching all the way from 400 B.C. to the present.
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Magnet Academy: Wheatstone Bridge 1843
Read about the device used for measuring resistance in a circuit which was discovered in 1843, but had been invented a decade earlier. The inventor's name was not Wheatstone.
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Magnet Academy: Walter Brattain (1902 1987)
Walter Houser Brattain discovered the photo-effect that occurs at the free surface of a semiconductor and was co-creator of the point-contact transistor, which paved the way for the more advanced types of transistors that eventually...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Felix Bloch (1905 1983)
Physicist Felix Bloch developed a non-destructive technique for precisely observing and measuring the magnetic properties of nuclear particles. He called his technique "nuclear induction," but nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) soon became...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Gerd Binnig
Gerd Binnig co-developed the scanning tunneling microscope (STM) with Heinrich Rohrer. The STM allowed scientists entry into the atomic world in a new way and was a major advance in the field of nanotechnology. For their achievement,...
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Magnet Academy: Georg Bednorz
J. Georg Bednorz jointly revolutionized superconductivity research with K. Alex Muller by discovering an entirely new class of superconductors, often referred to as high-temperature superconductors. They managed to achieve...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Andre Marie Ampere
Although he was not the first person to observe a connection between electricity and magnetism, Andre-Marie Ampere was the first scientist to attempt to theoretically explain and mathematically describe the phenomenon. His contributions...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Zeeman Effect 1896
Most of us have seen the rainbow-hued breakdown of the composition of light. Light is of course a form of energy. A magnetic field changes the behavior of light- a phenomenon known as the Zeeman effect.
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Wimshurst Machine 1880
In the modern world, virtually everyone is familiar with electricity as an accessible, essential form of energy. In electricity's earlier days, scientists used the buildup and release of static electricity.
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Magnet Academy: Anders Celsius
Anders Celsius is most familiar as the inventor of the temperature scale that bears his name. The Swedish astronomer, however, also is notable as the first person to make a connection between the radiant atmospheric phenomenon known as...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Willem Einthoven
Willem Einthoven invented a string galvanometer that lead to the electrocardiogram, which measures heart activity. For his discovery, Einthoven was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1924.
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Magnet Academy: Paul Dirac
Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac was an outstanding twentieth century theoretical physicist whose work was fundamental to the development of quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics jointly with...
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Lee De Forest
American inventor Lee De Forest was a pioneer of radio and motion pictures. He received more than 300 patents over the course of his lifetime, the most important of which was for a three-electrode vacuum tube, or triode, that he called...