A D V E N T U R E S in C Y B E R S O U N DKarl Ferdinand Braun, Dr : 1850 - 1918
The German physicist Karl Ferdinand Braun, b. June 6, 1850, d. Apr. 20, 1918, shared the 1909 Nobel Prize for physics with Guglielmo Marconi for his work in developing the radio. Braun, who spent his career as a professor of physics at German universities, increased the range of Marconi's transmitter, invented the crystal rectifier (a device that allows current to flow in only one direction, and improves radio transmission), and later invented the oscilloscope, a cathode-ray-tube laboratory device that was the forerunner of today's television and radar tubes.
Although German physicist Braun's main contributions were in pure science, he is best known for developing the first cathode-ray (the 'Braun tube') oscilloscope in 1897. This device produced line graphs of rapidly varying electrical signals and was the ancestor of today's television screen. In 1909 Karl Braun was awarded the Nobel Prize, along with his colaureate, Guglielmo Marconi, for "contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy."
Karl Ferdinand Braun, the german physicist, shared the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1909 with Guglielmo Marconi for the development of wireless telegraphy. Braun received his Ph.D. from the University of Berlin in 1872. After appointments at WŸrzburg, Leipzig, Marburg, Karlsruhe, and T Yuml;bingen, he became director of the Physical Institute and professor of physics at the University of Strasbourg in 1895. Braun was recognized by the Nobel committee for his improvement of Marconi's transmitting system. In early wireless transmission, the antenna was directly in the power circuit and broadcasting was limited to a range of about 15 kilometres. Braun solved this problem by producing a sparkless antenna circuit (patented in 1899) that linked transmitter power to the antenna circuit inductively. This invention greatly increased the broadcasting range of a transmitter and has been applied to radar, radio, and television. Braun's discovery of crystalline materials that act as rectifiers, allowing current to flow in one direction only, led to the development of crystal radio receivers. Braun is also known as the developer of the cathode-ray oscilloscope. He demonstrated the first oscilloscope (Braun tube) in 1897, after work on high-frequency alternating currents. Cathode-ray tubes had previously been characterized by uncontrolled rays; Braun succeeded in producing a narrow stream of electrons, guided by means of alternating voltage, that could trace patterns on a fluorescent screen. This invention, the forerunner of the television tube and radarscope, also became an important laboratory research instrument. Braun traveled to New York City in 1915 to testify in a radio-related patent case. He was detained there because of his German citizenship when the U.S. entered World War I in 1917; he died before the war ended.
Electronic television used a cathode-ray tube to produce a better picture. The cathode-ray tube was invented in 1897 by the German scientist Karl Braun. It used electrons. These are the very tiny particles that circle around the center of an atom. When they break away from the atom, they form a flow of electrons that we call electric current. Braun has discovered that a stream of electrons would make a screen coated with fluorescent material glow with light. This stream of electrons, called a cathode ray, could be focused to a point at the end of the tube. In other words, it could be used to reproduce the points of light and dark in a picture of a person or an object, such as those in a photograph.
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