Actually Edison is not the only one who invented the light bulb?

Although Thomas Edison is often thought to have invented the light bulb, the famous American inventor is not the only one contributing to the development of this revolutionary technology. Many other notable characters are also remembered for their work with electric batteries, light bulbs and creating the first incandescent light bulbs.

Initial research and development

The story of light bulbs began long before Edison patented the light bulb.

The story of the bulb began long before Edison was granted a patent for the successful invention of the light bulb and put it into commerce for the first time in 1879. In 1800, Italian inventor Alessandro Volta developed First practical method to produce electricity, which is the voltage. Made from interwoven plates of zinc and copper, alternating with glossy paper layers soaked in salt water, conductive poles when copper wires are connected at both ends. While considered as the predecessor of today's modern batteries, Volta's bright copper wire is also considered one of the earliest manifestations of flash light.

Shortly after Volta discovered a constant power source for the Royal Society in London, a chemist and British inventor Humphry Davy produced the first electric light in the world by connecting columns. Voltaic electricity with charcoal electrodes. Davy's invention 1802 is known as an electric arc lamp, named for the arc of light emitted between its two carbon rods.

While Davy's arc lamp is definitely an improvement on Volta's independent things, it is still not a real lighting source. This rudimentary lamp burns fast and too bright for indoor use or work space. But the principles behind Davy's arc light were used during the 1800s in the development of many electric bulbs and other light bulbs.

Light bulbs use platinum coil nanowires.

In 1840, the British scientist Warren de la Rue developed a light bulb that was effectively designed using platinum-coil nanowires instead of copper, but the high cost of platinum made it impossible for the light bulb to become a commercial success. And in 1848, William Staite improved the life of conventional arc lamps by developing a clock mechanism that regulates the movement of carbon rods to prevent rapid corrosion. However, the cost of batteries used to power Staite's lights reduced the budget for the inventor's commercial projects.

Joseph Swan vs Thomas Edison

In 1850, British chemist Joseph Swan solved the cost-effective problem of previous inventors, and in 1860 he developed a light bulb using carbonized filaments instead of platinum fibers. According to the Smithsonian Institute, Swan received a patent in the United Kingdom in 1878, and in February 1879 he proved a working lamp in a lecture in Newcastle, England. Like previous versions of bulbs, Swan's hair is placed in a vacuum tube to minimize exposure to oxygen, extending their lifespan. Unfortunately for Swan, his day-to-day vacuum pumps are not as effective as they are now, and although his prototype works well, practical use is not satisfactory.

Edison realized that the problem with Swan's design was the filament . A thin filament with high resistance will make the bulb more efficient because it will only need a bit of electricity to make it bright. He demonstrated his light bulb in December 1879. Swan incorporated improvements into his light bulb and established an electric lighting company in England. Edison sued for patent infringement, but Swan's patent was a strong statement, at least in the UK, and the two inventors eventually joined together, establishing Edison-Swan United , becoming one of the largest lamp manufacturers in the world.

Thomas Edison and invent his light bulb.

Swan is not the only rival Edison. In 1874, Canadian inventors, Henry Woodward and Matthew Evans , published their patents for an electric lamp with different carbon rods held between electrodes in a full glass of nitrogen. The two tried but failed to commercialize their lights, eventually selling the patent to Edison in 1879.

The success of the Edison light bulb was followed by the birth of Edison Electric Illuminating in New York in 1880. The company was founded by financial contributions from JP Morgan and other wealthy investors. at that time. The company has built the first power generation stations that can power new electrical systems and patented bulbs. The first power station was opened in September 1882 on Pearl Street in Manhattan.

According to the US Department of Energy, other inventors, such as William Sawyer and Albon Man, merged their company with Edison and became Power Corporation.

The first real light of the light bulb

According to Edison, he succeeded and surpassed competitors in developing a cheap and practical light bulb. Edison and his team in Edison's lab in Menlo Park, New Jersey, tested more than 3,000 designs for light bulbs between 1878 and 1880. In November 1879, Edison filed a patent for a Electric lamp with carbon fiber . The patent listed a number of materials that can be used for hairs, including cotton, linen and wood. Edison spent the next year finding the perfect wire for his new light bulb, testing more than 6,000 trees to determine which material will burn the longest.

A few months after his patent in 1879, Edison and his team found that a carbon fiber filament could burn more than 1,200 hours. Bamboo was used as a filament in Edison's light bulb until it began to be replaced with more durable materials in the 1880s and early 1900s.

In 1882, Lewis Howard Latimer, one of Edison's researchers, was patented with a more efficient way to produce filament. And in 1903, Willis R. Whitney invented a method for handling these filaments that allowed them to burn without blackening the inside of the glass bulb.

Tungsten fiber

Tungsten has the highest melting point of any chemical element.

William David Coolidge, an American physicist with General Electric, improved the company's tungsten fiber method in 1910. Tungsten has the highest melting point of any chemical element, known to Edison. coming is a great material for filament bulbs, but the machinery needed to produce tungsten wire must be of very good quality, and not available at the end of the 19th century. Tungsten is still the main material used. used in hot incandescent filament today.

Led light

LED lighting is considered the future of light due to lower energy requirements to operate, with a lower price to pay monthly, and longer life than traditional incandescent light bulbs.

Nick Holonyak, an American scientist at General Electric, accidentally invented a red LED light while trying to create a laser in the early 1960s. Like other inventors, the principle of some sold Brilliant photoluminescence when electricity was used since the early 1900s, but Holonyak was the first to patent for use as a fixture.

LED LEDs are considered to be the future of light due to lower energy requirements to operate.

According to DOE's instructions, within a few years, yellow and green LEDs were added and used in many applications including indicators, computer monitors and traffic lights. Blue LEDs were created in the early 1990s by Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura, a group of Japanese and American scientists, and they won the Nobel Prize in 2014. Green LED allows scientists Create white LED bulbs by coating diodes with phosphorus.

Technology change

Nowadays, the choice of light has expanded and it is possible to choose different types of light bulbs, including compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) that work by heating gas and emitting light and shadow. led light.

Some lighting companies are pushing the limits of what light bulbs can do, including Phillips and Stack. Phillips is one of many companies that have created wireless light bulbs that can be controlled through smartphone applications. Phillips Hue uses LED technology that can quickly turn on or off or dimmed by an app on a smartphone screen and can also be programmed differently depending on the intended use. High-end fluorescent bulbs can even be set up in different colors (about sixteen million colors) and synchronized with music, movies and video games.

Stack, started by Tesla engineers and NASA, developed a smart light bulb using LED technology with many different functions. It can automatically detect ambient light and adjust as needed, it turns off and turns on the motion sensor when someone enters the room, can be used as a wake-up alert and even adjust color throughout the day to match human natural biological cycles and patterns of natural light. The bulbs also have an integrated learning program to accommodate the inputs provided by users over time. And all these functions can be programmed or monitored from any smartphone or tablet.

These bulbs are compatible with many options to turn the whole house into a smart home including Apple's use of Amazon Alexa, GoogleHome and HomeKit.