Reels tagged #electricity
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Inventions
Edison tested over 6,000 materials for one filament
The bulb wasn't a single flash of genius. Edison's team tried thousands of substances, including bamboo, before finding a carbon filament that glowed for more than 1,200 hours.
Inventions
The first battery was stacks of coins and brine
Volta's 1800 pile of copper and zinc discs separated by salt-soaked cloth gave the world its first steady electric current and made electrical science possible.
Inventions
Faraday's first motor fit in a glass of mercury
In 1821 Michael Faraday made a wire rotate continuously around a magnet in a mercury bath. Nearly all electric motors today descend from that desktop experiment.
Inventions
Alternating current won because it travels cheaply
AC can be stepped up to high voltage and sent hundreds of kilometres with small losses. Direct current needed a power station every few kilometres.