Edison’s light bulb

Thomas Edison used this carbon filament lamp in the first public demonstration of his most famous invention, the light bulb, the first practical electric incandescent lamp. A light bulb emits light when an electric current passes through a metal filament, heating it to a high temperature until it glows. The hot filament is protected from air by a glass bulb filled with an inert gas. The demonstration took place at Edison’s Menlo Park, New Jersey laboratory on New Year’s Eve 1879.

Electric light, one of the everyday conveniences that most affects our lives, was not “invented” in the traditional sense in 1879 by Thomas Alva Edison, although we could say that he has created the first commercially practical incandescent light bulb.

Edison personified the ideal of a hardworking individual who achieved success on his own. He obtained a record 1,093 patents and became an accomplished entrepreneur. Although sometimes unsuccessful, Edison and his team developed many practical devices in their “invention factory” and strengthened their belief in technological progress.

by Veronika Hohosha

Galileo Galilei and his telescope

The first record of a telescope comes from the Netherlands in 1608.

Galileo invented an improved telescope that let him observe and describe the moons of Jupiter, the rings of Saturn, the phases of Venus, sunspots and the rugged lunar surface

An optical telescope gathers and focuses light mainly from the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum (although some work in the infared and ultraviolet). Optical telescopes increase the apparent angular size of distant objects as well as their apparent brightness. In order for the image to be observed, photographed, studied, and sent to a computer, telescopes work by employing one or more curved optical elements, usually made from glass lenses and/or mirrors, to gather light and other electromagnetic radiation to bring that light or radiation to a focal point. Optical telescopes are used for astronomy and in many non-astronomical instruments, including: theodolites (including transits), spotting – scopes, monoculars, binoculars, camera lenses, and spyglasses

                                                         By Stanislav Pasichnui

Alexander Fleming 

                   Penicillin                      

In 1928 Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin, though he did not realize the full significance of his discovery for at least another decade. He eventually received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945.

Fleming’s legendary discovery of penicillin occurred in 1928, while he was investigating staphylococcus, a common type of bacteria that causes boils and can also cause disastrous infections in patients with weakened immune systems. Before Fleming left for a two-week vacation, a petri dish containing a staphylococcus culture was left on a lab bench and never placed in the incubator as intended. Somehow, in preparing the culture, a Penicillium mold spore had been accidentally introduced into the medium—perhaps coming in through a window, or more likely floating up a stairwell from the lab below where various molds were being cultured. The temperature conditions that prevailed during Fleming’s absence permitted both the bacteria and the mold spores to grow; had the incubator been used, only the bacteria could have grown.

  Penicillin was discovered in 1928 by Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming as a crude extract of P. rubens. Fleming’s student Cecil George Paine was the first to successfully use penicillin to treat eye infection (ophthalmia neonatorum) in 1930. The purified compound (penicillin F) was isolated in 1940 by a research team led by Howard Florey and Ernst Boris Chain at the University of Oxford. Fleming first used the purified penicillin to treat streptococcal meningitis in 1942. For the discovery, Fleming shared the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Florey and Chain.

by Daniil Hubin

The first plane

The outstanding Italian inventor Leonardo da Vinci was the first to propose an airplane project.

Then one of the pioneers of aviation, Otto Lilienthal, developed, built and tested eleven gliders, on which he made more than 2 thousand flights.

The first aircraft in which people were able to get off the ground and make a level flight was the Flyer, built by the brothers Orville and Wilber Wright in the United States. The first famous plane flight in the history of mankind took place on December 17, 1903.

The pilot stayed in the air for 59 seconds and flew 260 meters. Wright’s invention was officially recognized as the world’s first heavier-than-air aircraft to fly manned using an engine.

The only problem with Wright’s plane was that it couldn’t take off on its own. For takeoff, a strong headwind was required, and the launch was carried out from the rails.

By Amina Rasulova

The first motorcycle

Believe it or not, motorcycle predates the 20th century. The first motorcycle, the Daimler Reitwagen, was invented in Germany by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach in 1885. It was revolutionary for its use of a gasoline-powered engine, and Daimler’s son Paul was its first test rider.

The invention of the Daimler Reitwagen led to automobile production a year later. Basically, Daimler’s motorcycle was essentially a wooden bicycle frame without foot pedals that was powered by a one-cylinder Otto-cycle engine and included a spray-type carburetor. Unlike other engines of its time, this engine was small and powerful compared with other combustion engines of the day used for stationary operation.

Daimler’s priority was making his engine usable for mobile vehicles. While the Daimler Reitwagen’s predecessors are considered motorcycles, the Daimler Reitwagen remains the first gasoline internal combustion motorcycle, and the forerunner of all land, sea, and air vehicles to use this type of engine.

by Maksym Siroha

The first computer

The story began back in the distant forties. No matter how bad the Second World War was, but it was she who gave a powerful impetus to the development of technology, and it was in those years that the first ideas of computers (compute – to calculate, English) were born and implemented.

he world’s first programmable computer was designed and built in 1941 by Harvard mathematician Howard Akson in collaboration with IBM engineers. But the Official Launch took place on August 7, 1944. The Mark 1 computer was located at Harvard University.

The computer cost $ 500,000. It was assembled from stainless steel and glass and was 2.5 meters high and 17 meters long. The computer weighed 4.5 tons and covered an area of u200bu200bseveral tens of square meters. He worked on electromechanical relays and had a total of about 765,000 parts.

The first computer had wires with a total length of almost 800 kilometers. He could operate on 72 numbers with 23 decimal places. For each operation of subtraction or addition, the computer spent 3 seconds, and for operations of multiplication and division 6 and 15.3 seconds, respectively. Programming and data entry were carried out using punched cards.

The Mark 1 was the very first automatic computing machine that did not require human intervention to complete its program.

by Vitalii Kozakov

Refrigerator

The real creator of the refrigerator is Oliver Evans. In 1805, he developed a refrigeration machine that worked on the principle of steam-compression, but it did not come to practical use. And already in 1834, based on its development, Jacob Perkins created and received a patent for the world’s first refrigerator.Four years later, American physician John Gorrie developed the principles of modern refrigerated refrigerators using compressors.But all these inventions brought little benefit to people in everyday life,

because they were bulky, dangerous and very expensive. The first attempt to to create an inexpensive household appliance was made by Karl von Lindev, but he did not become smaller.The first popular models of household refrigerators appeared only in 1916.

By Marina Kondratova

The first TV

The world’s first television was released in December 1936. In 1922, the Scottish engineer John Loggi Byrd began to develop television equipment and three years later was able to transmit the first recognizable images of human faces. In 1926, at the Royal Institute in London, Byrd demonstrated the first operational telesystem that transmits moving images. In the late 1920s, General Electric became a pioneer in the production of televisions using technology developed in his own research laboratory by Ernest Alexanderson (1878-1975). Byrd also began developing television equipment for the German postal service in 1929.

By Maria Taran

The first camera

Did you know that the negative appeared after the invention of the modern camera, the first photo paper was made of asphalt, or rather asphalt varnish was applied to a copper or glass plate, and the first photographic devices appeared in ancient Greece. However, they can be called cameras only with a stretch, although we still use the word “camera”, without thinking that in Latin it is nothing more than a room, which was the first prototype of the camera.

According to some data, today the number of digitally printed photos in the world alone exceeds 65 billion, ie ten times the population of the Earth. This is despite the fact that only two photos out of ten are printed on paper.

Photography has become an indispensable attribute of modernity, and the cameras themselves have long ceased to be even a separate subject: they are equipped with phones, laptops, tablets. Of course, this does not always guarantee the desired quality, but it helps when there is nothing better at hand. Be that as it may, our ancestors could only dream of such an “assortment”. And that’s exactly what they did not succeed – to carry the first prototypes of cameras.

The fact is that the first device similar (at least in its principle) to the camera, was a pinhole device. This invention was known in the third century BC in ancient Greece. The device was a dark room. It seems that since then came the name “camera”, which comes from the Latin camera, ie “room”. The mathematician Euclid suggested making a hole in the wall and using additional tools to project the image on the opposite wall. However, the image thus turned out inverted.

And only almost two thousand years later – in 1573, the Italian Ignacio Danti, to turn the image, guessed to use a mirror. And 30 years later, Johann Kepler used lenses in the pinhole camera and thus enlarged the image.

But the main problem remained unsolved – the camera was not very comfortable and large. However, it did not last long. As early as 1665, the English physicist and chemist Robert Boyle designed the first small pinhole camera. And, despite this, the world was far from the triumphant “march” of photography. For a long time, scientists could not figure out how to solve the problem of the image disappearing when exposed to light. The solution was proposed by Swiss chemist Carl Scheele. In 1770, he proved that the image obtained with silver chloride and treated with ammonia is not erased. And only after that the pictures began to appear on paper. And it will be later.

Since the 1800s, the development of the camera has gained momentum. But it was not until 1812 that Joseph Nicephorus Niepce invented the pinhole camera with a lens and a sliding tube. This invention became the first device similar to a modern camera. The development of the camera as a device was very successful, but the problem was to capture the image on any material for a long time. In 1820, Niepce used glass and asphalt varnish to fix the image. He then used a zinc plate with asphalt varnish and, a few years later, he was able to take a picture in which the image did not disappear immediately. The photo showed the usual view from the window of the inventor.

This is despite the fact that the negative was invented only 10 years later – in 1835. After that, an active process of photography began, in which plates and soon films were used. In 1889, George Eastman patented a roll of film and a camera that could take pictures quickly. He called his invention “Kodak”. Color photography appeared in 1935, and in 1963 caused a sensation camera “Polaroid”. Since 1970, cameras have been improved with the help of electronics, and in 1988 Fujifilm released the first digital camera.

1826 is the first photograph that did not disappear immediately after its appearance. The first person who managed to make a “photographic” picture permanent, ie to fix the image, was the Frenchman Joseph Niepce. The first in the history of photography is the picture “View from the window”, dated 1826. 1861 – The first color photograph was taken by the English physicist James Maxwell. 1865 – T. Stepton invents the mirror lens, and the camera itself acquires a familiar appearance. This camera has already made it possible to take photos of fairly high quality. 1889 – Kodak creates film

1904 – The Lumière brothers make a discovery that becomes a revolutionary event in photography. They suggested using special plates that made it possible to create color photographs. 1925 – Mass production of cameras begins. The first production cameras were produced under the Leica brand. This camera, which used 35 mm wide film, has long been a leader in the production of cameras. 1963 – Polaroid creates a camera that takes photos instantly. 1980s – The release of digital video cameras begins, which are familiar and familiar to each of us today.

By Danilo Tkachenko

History of the compass

compass was invented more than 2000 years ago. The first compasses were made of lodestone, a naturally magnetized stone of iron, in China (20 BC – 20 AD). The compass was later used for navigation during the Chinese Song Dynasty (960–1279 AD), as described by Shen Kuo. Later compasses were made of iron needles, magnetized by striking them with a lodestone. Magnetized needles and compasses were first described in medieval Europe by the English theologian Alexander Neckam (1157–1217 AD). Dry compasses begin appearing around 1300 in Medieval Europe and the Medieval.This was replaced in the early 20th century by the liquid-filled magnetic compass

Compass Making

A simple as it is, there is a skill in how to use compass, especially when it is used with other tools and instruments, and knowledge in how it works. As compass was perfected, its use became more complex.

Facts about the Compass

The first compass used on boats and that had no liquid that would hold it in a horizontal position was a dry compass. Its main part was a standard magnetic compass which was placed in the three ring gimbal that held compass horizontal position during the rough sea.

Magnetic compass does not point to a geographic pole (so called true pole), but to the magnetic pole. That is why some correction must be done before determining of the true North.

Western and Arab compass has 32 defined points on its rose-of-winds. Eastern has 24 and 48 points.

Older roses-of-winds didn’t have marked sides of the world but the names of the winds.

by Viktoria Okley