Kathy Joseph's Blog, page 3
October 27, 2022
The Origin of The Photoelectric Effect: How Lenard Inspired and Then Terrorized Einstein
When we talk about the photoelectric effect, we usually only mention Albert Einstein. After all, Einstein did win the Nobel Prize for creating the modern interpretation of the photoelectric effect. But Einstein didn’t discover the photoelectric effect. In fact, Einstein didn’t do any photoelectric effect experiments! Instead, Einstein was inspired by the experiments and theories by a man named Philip Lenard. Lenard is a fascinating person.
So who did discover it, who did the landmark expe...
Positive Feedback (Regeneration) How a College Student Invented it in 1912!
It all started with an extremely smart and tragically stubborn college student named Edwin Howard Armstrong. Howard (he went by his middle name) grew up in Manhattan when it was just a relaxed suburb of New York to middle class family. In 1904, when he was 13, his father gave him “The Boy’s Book of Inventions” and young Armstrong was hooked.
H...
The Trials of Howard Armstrong
Wait, how can a good invention lead to the inventor’s destruction?
Table of ContentsArmstrong’s StruggleThe Frequency ModulationSarnoff’s MistakeArmstrong’s RiseThe Law SuitArmstrong’s DeathReferencesArmstrong’s StruggleHowever, at the same time Armstrong was dealing with several lawsuits. The longest of which was with Lee de Forest. De Forest had invented the vacuum triode in the first place (as a way to get around another person’s patented light...
How Wilhelm Roentgen Discovered X-rays
So, why is an x-ray called an x-ray? The short answer is that when Wilhelm Roentgen discovered x-rays in 1895, he called them x-rays outright because x stood for unknown and he knew he had found a new, previously unknown ray. Ok, bye! But I still haven’t answered how did Roentgen know he had discovered a new kind of light and why did the name stick outside of Germany and why do x-rays have a totally different name in German? I’ll tell you.
Table of ContentsCrookes’ Stu...October 25, 2022
The Discovery of Alpha, Beta, and Gamma Rays
In this video I am going to talk about the three major types of nuclear radiation: alpha, beta and gamma, distinguished by how powerful they are, alpha being easier to block then beta which is easier to block than gamma.
There are quite a few videos about what these radiations are but almost nothing on how we know what they are. Why was alpha and beta radiation discovered before gamma, how did these discoveries relate to the discovery that a beam in a vacuum tube called cathode rays was real...
How Howard Armstrong Invented Positive Feedback
Positive feedback in electronics, or when a small change is feed into a loop to magnify itself is a vital part of electrical engineering. But where did it come from and how does it work? I actually know the answer to that: it was created by a 20-year-old college student named Howard Armstrong in his parent’s attic on a summer night in 1912! This is a story of a childhood book, a rule-breaking neighbor, an inspiring immigrant, and a very, very, very important coil of wire.
Ta...Howard Armstrong, David Sarnoff And the Influential Superheterodyne Receiver
The superheterodyne method is where two signals are mixed to make a lower frequency signal that is easier to deal with, and, according to Wikipedia, “virtually all modern radio receivers use the superheterodyne principle.” But where did it come from and how does it work and why (and how) did it usher radio broadcasting into the mainstream? This is the story of Howard Armstrong, the brilliant engineer who thought of it in the middle of a bombing raid, and David Sarnoff, the determined immigrant ...
Howard Armstrong and Frequency Modulation
Frequency modulation or FM radio transformed how we communicate. It was, as Armstrong’s nemesis David Sarnoff said, “a revolution”. There are videos, books, and articles about this history but they seem to skim over the science. In fact, I haven’t seen any videos or articles that simply and accurately describe how Armstrong’s original system actually worked!
This video is my attempt to explain how and why Armstrong invented FM radio and how it was so amazing that it led to his destruction....
Why Werner Heisenberg Worked for Hitler
In June of 1939, 37-year-old Werner Heisenberg went on a tour of America for a cosmic-ray symposium, and everywhere he went everyone wanted to know why, why, why was he staying in Germany?
Heisenberg was no obvious anti-Semite, in fact, he had lost most of his friends, mentors and students to Hitler’s anti-Semitism and had just fought a symbolic war against the regime that wanted to label all theoretical Physics and physicists “Jewish filth”, and as Enrico Fermi’s wife Laura put it to him, ...
How Max Planck Fought The Nazis
Was Max Planck a fundamentally decent man who actually confronted Hitler and tried his best to thwart the damage inflicted by the fascist regime, especially towards Jewish scientists?
Yes! Was Planck also complicit in the Nazi regime of terror by capitulating to Hitler’s demands and convincing others of the futility of protest? Yes! How can both be true? Let me explain.
Table of ContentsPlanck’s Tragic Birthday CelebrationThe Max Planck Award And The Rise of Hit...
