Rube Goldberg’s Least Complicated Invention Was His Cartooning Career

The name Rube Goldberg has long been synonymous with any overly-built contraption played for laughs that solves a simple problem through complicated means. But it might surprise you to learn that the man himself was not an engineer or inventor …read more

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Paul Taylor Opened the Lines of Telecommunication for the Hearing-Impaired

These days, nearly everyone communicates through some kind of keyboard, whether they are texting, emailing, or posting on various internet discussion forums. Talking over the phone is almost outmoded at this point. But only a few decades ago, the telephone …read more

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James West Began 40 Years at Bell Labs with World-Changing Microphone Tech

I’d be surprised if you weren’t sitting within fifty feet of one of James Edward Maceo West’s most well-known inventions — the electret microphone. Although MEMS microphones have seen a dramatic rise as smartphone technology progresses, electret microphones still sit …read more

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Dancho Danchev’s Biography – The Inside Story Behind the Life of ex-Bulgarian Hacker Dancho Danchev – Recommended Reading!

Dear blog readers,I’ve decided to take the time and effort and say big thanks to everyone who’s been following my research since December, 2005 and has been touching base to say “hi” or to offer operational support or to share their “know-how” and opin… Continue reading Dancho Danchev’s Biography – The Inside Story Behind the Life of ex-Bulgarian Hacker Dancho Danchev – Recommended Reading!

Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin Saw Through the Stars

We as humans are limited in the ways we can look at things ourselves, and rely on on the different perspectives and insights of others to help make sense of things. All it takes is one person to look at a data set and find something completely different that changes …read more

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Remembering Chuck Yeager: The Supersonic Legend Whose Wings Were Clipped By A High School Diploma

In history there are people whose legacy becomes larger than life. Ask anyone who built and flew the first airplane, and you’d be hard-pressed to find someone who isn’t at least aware of the accomplishments of the Wright brothers. In a similar vein, Chuck Yeager’s pioneering trip into supersonic territory …read more

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Garrett Augustus Morgan Made the World Safer

Some people invent with the intent of seeking fame and prestige. Few inventors seem to truly care about other people the way that Garrett Augustus Morgan did. His inventions saved many lives, including those of a few people who were rescued by Garrett himself after an explosion tore through a …read more

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Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna Sharpened Mother Nature’s Genetic Scissors and Won the Nobel for It

It sounds like science fiction — and until 2012, the ability to cheaply and easily edit strings of DNA was exactly that. But as it turns out, CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing is a completely natural function in which bacteria catalogs its interactions with viruses by taking a snippet of the virus’ …read more

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Lewis Latimer Drafted the Future of Electric Light

These days, we have LED light bulbs that will last a decade. But it wasn’t so long ago that incandescent lamps were all we had, and they burned out after several months. Thomas Edison’s early light bulbs used bamboo filaments that burned out very quickly. An inventor and draftsman named …read more

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