Videocassette recorder

The invention:

 A device for recording and playing back movies
and television programs, the videocassette recorder (VCR) revolutionized
the home entertainment industry in the late 1970’s.


The company behind the invention:

Philips Corporation, a Dutch Company

Velcro

The invention: 

A material comprising millions of tiny hooks and
loops that work together to create powerful and easy-to-use fasteners
for a wide range of applications.

The person behind the invention:

Georges de Mestral (1904-1990), a Swiss engineer and inventor

Vat dye

The invention:

The culmination of centuries of efforts to mimic the
brilliant colors displayed in nature in dyes that can be used in
many products.

The people behind the invention:

Sir William Henry Perkin (1838-1907), an English student in
Hofmann’s laboratory
René Bohn (1862-1922), a synthetic organic chemist
Karl Heumann (1850-1894), a German chemist who taught Bohn
Roland Scholl (1865-1945), a Swiss chemist who established the
correct structure of Bohn’s dye
August Wilhelm von Hofmann (1818-1892), an organic chemist

Vacuum tube

The invention:

 A sealed glass tube from which air and gas have
been removed to permit electrons to move more freely, the vacuum
tube was the heart of electronic systems until it was displaced
by transistors.


The people behind the invention:

Sir John Ambrose Fleming (1849-1945), an English physicist
and professor of electrical engineering
Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931), an American inventor
Lee de Forest (1873-1961), an American scientist and inventor
Arthur Wehnelt (1871-1944), a German inventor

Vacuum cleaner

The invention:

The first portable domestic vacuum cleaner successfully
adapted to electricity, the original machine helped begin
the electrification of domestic appliances in the early twentieth
century.


The people behind the invention:

H. Cecil Booth (1871-1955), a British civil engineer
Melville R. Bissell (1843-1889), the inventor and marketer of the
Bissell carpet sweeper in 1876
William Henry Hoover (1849-1932), an American industrialist
James Murray Spangler (1848-1915), an American inventor

UNIVAC Computer

The invention: 

The first commercially successful computer system.

The people behind the invention:

John Presper Eckert (1919-1995), an American electrical engineer
John W. Mauchly (1907-1980), an American physicist
John von Neumann (1903-1957), a Hungarian American
mathematician
Howard Aiken (1900-1973), an American physicist
George Stibitz (1904-1995), a scientist at Bell Labs

Ultrasound

The invention: 

A medically safe alternative to X-ray examination,
ultrasound uses sound waves to detect fetal problems in pregnant
women.

The people behind the invention:

Ian T. Donald (1910-1987), a British obstetrician

Paul Langévin (1872-1946), a French physicist

Marie Curie (1867-1946) and Pierre Curie (1859-1906), the French husband-and-wife team that researched and developed the field of radioactivity

Alice Stewart, a British researcher

Ultramicroscope

The invention: 

A microscope characterized by high-intensity illumination
for the study of exceptionally small objects, such as colloidal
substances.


The people behind the invention:

Richard Zsigmondy (1865-1929), an Austrian-born German
organic chemist who won the 1925 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
H. F. W. Siedentopf (1872-1940), a German physicist-optician
Max von Smouluchowski (1879-1961), a German organic
chemist.

Ultracentrifuge

The invention: 

Asuper-high-velocity centrifuge designed to separate
colloidal or submicroscopic substances, the ultracentrifuge
was used to measure the molecular weight of proteins and
proved that proteins are large molecules.

Typhus vaccine

The invention: 

The first effective vaccine against the virulent typhus
disease.

The person behind the invention:

Hans Zinsser (1878-1940), an American bacteriologist and
immunologist

Turbojet

The invention:

 A jet engine with a turbine-driven compressor that
uses its hot-gas exhaust to develop thrust.

 The people behind the invention:

Henry Harley Arnold (1886-1950), a chief of staff of the U.S.
Army Air Corps
Gerry Sayer, a chief test pilot for Gloster Aircraft Limited
Hans Pabst von Ohain (1911- ), a German engineer
Sir Frank Whittle (1907-1996), an English Royal Air Force
officer and engineer

Tupperware

The invention:

Trademarked food-storage products that changed
the way Americans viewed plastic products and created a model
for selling products in consumers homes.

The people behind the invention:

Earl S. Tupper (1907-1983), founder of Tupperware
Brownie Wise, the creator of the vast home sales network for
Tupperware
Morison Cousins (1934-2001), a designer hired by Tupperware
to modernize its products in the early 1990’s

Tungsten filament

The invention: 

Metal filament used in the incandescent light bulbs
that have long provided most of the world’s electrical lighting.


The people behind the invention:

William David Coolidge (1873-1975), an American electrical
engineer
Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931), an American inventor

Tuberculosis vaccine

The invention: 

Vaccine that uses an avirulent (nondisease) strain
of bovine tuberculosis bacilli that is safer than earlier vaccines.


The people behind the invention:

Albert Calmette (1863-1933), a French microbiologist
Camille Guérin (1872-1961), a French veterinarian and
microbiologist
Robert Koch (1843-1910), a German physician and
microbiologist

Transistor radio

The invention:

 Miniature portable radio that used transistors and
created a new mass market for electronic products.

Transistor

The invention: 

A miniature electronic device, comprising a tiny
semiconductor and multiple electrical contacts, used in circuits
as an amplifier, detector, or switch, that revolutionized electronics
in the mid-twentieth century.

The people behind the invention:

William B. Shockley (1910-1989), an American physicist who led
the Bell Laboratories team that produced the first transistors
Akio Morita (1921-1999), a Japanese physicist and engineer who
was the cofounder of the Sony electronics company
Masaru Ibuka (1908-1997), a Japanese electrical engineer and
businessman who cofounded Sony with Morita

Touch-tone telephone

The invention: 

A push-button dialing system for telephones that
replaced the earlier rotary-dial phone.

The person behind the invention:

Bell Labs, the research and development arm of the American
Telephone and Telegraph Company

Tidal power plant

The invention:

Plant that converts the natural ocean tidal forces
into electrical power.

The people behind the invention:

Mariano di Jacopo detto Taccola (Mariano of Siena, 1381-1453),
an Italian notary, artist, and engineer
Bernard Forest de Bélidor (1697 or 1698-1761), a French engineer
Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945), president of the United States

Thermal cracking process

The invention: 

Process that increased the yield of refined gasoline
extracted from raw petroleum by using heat to convert complex
hydrocarbons into simpler gasoline hydrocarbons, thereby making
possible the development of the modern petroleum industry.

The people behind the invention:

William M. Burton (1865-1954), an American chemist
Robert E. Humphreys (1942- ), an American chemist

Tevatron accelerator

The invention: 

A particle accelerator that generated collisions between
beams of protons and antiprotons at the highest energies
ever recorded.

The people behind the invention:

Robert Rathbun Wilson (1914- ), an American physicist and
director of Fermilab from 1967 to 1978
John Peoples (1933- ), an American physicist and deputy
director of Fermilab from 1987