Seven Nikola Tesla Inventions That Changed The World
165 years ago, on July 10, 1856, the Serbian-American engineer and inventor Nikola Tesla was born. The genius scientist has more than 700 inventions and patents. Some of his ideas changed the world, while others anticipated the inventions of the future. In our selection – about the most important of them.
1. Alternating current.
In the 19th century, mankind used direct current. It could not be transmitted over long distances, which prevented widespread electrification. The alternating current that we use today was known, but it was not used due to the lack of efficient AC motors.
In his pioneering works, Nikola Tesla was able to solve this problem. In 1888, the ingenious engineer received seven US patents for AC systems and brushless motors, paving the way for the worldwide use of AC.
2. Tesla’s transformer.
It is a resonant transformer that produces high voltage at high frequency. The output voltage in such a coil can reach several million volts and create impressive electrical discharges in the air of many meters in length, as in this famous photograph showing Tesla himself reading with monster discharges all around him.
With his invention, Tesla anticipated a new branch of electrical engineering – high frequency (HF) technology.
3. Radio communication
Tesla was one of the first to patent a method for reliably obtaining currents that can be used in radio communications. He described and demonstrated its principles in a public lecture in 1891. This happened five years before the Russian scientist Alexander Popov, at a closed meeting of the Russian Physicochemical Society in St. Petersburg, for the first time in the world transmitted a radio telegram.
4. Hydroelectric power plant
In 1895, Tesla designed one of the first AC hydroelectric power plants in the United States at Niagara Falls. The following year, it was used to power the city of Buffalo, New York. This achievement has received widespread publicity around the world and has helped AC electricity become the world’s power grid.
5. Radio remote control
In 1898, at an exhibition of electrical engineering, Tesla demonstrated to the public a boat that used radio control based on a coherer (something like a resistor). Tesla called his invention a “teleautomatom”. This was the “great-grandfather” of remote control devices.
6. X-rays
The pioneer of X-rays was the German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen in 1895. But experiments with X-radiation were carried out by several scientists before him. Back in 1887, Nikola Tesla began experiments with vacuum tubes. By introducing them into the field of high-frequency currents, Tesla registered visible light, ultraviolet radiation and unusual rays that left strange prints on metal screens. He talked about them in public lectures and showed X-rays.
Busy with other interesting projects for himself, Tesla did not complete the study of X-rays, yielding the palm to his German colleague.
7. Worldwide wireless system
Tesla dreamed of building a global system for wireless transmission of radio signals and electricity. In 1901, he began building the first wireless telecommunications tower on Long Island, called Wardenclyffe.
Due to funding problems, the project was abandoned in 1906, and the tower itself was demloished in 1917, after wireless transmission of electricity proved impossible. There were rumours it was demolished on the orders of the US government, fearing that the tower would become a beacon for German ships. Today, the ideas of wireless communication and energy are embodied in almost all modern gadgets.
He was competition to A G Bell!
Some people go crazy over his electric cars!
Tesla’s ability to foresee engineering principles far in advance of their practical application was amazing. Ed’s quoted article describes well what we know of his inventions but what has never been revealed has been bread & butter for conspirational theorists for decades.
He was a prolific inventor. For instance he developed an “earthquake machine” that through resonance nearly destroyed the building housing his laboratory. Some link this to the HAARP research.
When Tesla died the US government of the time seized all of his research documents (60-80 trunk fulls has been cited) because they didn’t want information that could be used to develop armaments to fall into enemy hands. Some were eventually released to his estate & others have been published as recently as 2018.
But what hasn’t been released? Plans for a death ray or some other population reducer?
The stare you get from Cindy as she gets pissed with you for not believing she is the source of all truth might be considered a death ray.
Perhaps the tart could stare into a mirror until it takes effect !!
She has no use for a mirror.
Her kind don’t have an image.
Apart from reality (which is bloody amazing), I also love the treatment he gets in movies. There’s an almost Jules Verne, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen type of vibe with a hint of steampunk thrown into the mixture.
He did not always get the good treatment in his lifetime.
The dollar focused yankees were sniffing around him to see what they could commercialise
They did the same with Marconi and no doubt other inventors.
Then ran away and locked in their own patents in many cases.
$$$$$
The yanks are not that good as inventors but like to nick others ideas.
Tesla wanted to provide free electricity to people from natural sources.
(Stated as a holder of Vector Meridian and Mercury shares 🙂 )
If Tesla was alive today, he would be thwarted by the government and big business, no matter what he did. He’d probably be offered a job in Area 51, or made to disappear into a faceless government contracting firm. If he declined, he would be told all of his inventions would be slapped with one of these:
https://www.wired.com/2013/04/gov-secrecy-orders-on-patents/
If that didn’t work, it would be a tragic unexpected accident.
Apparently Tesla believed in eugenics. Didn’t like Jews, and promoted the idea of sterilisation for criminals.