History of Electronics – Key Vocabulary

A comprehensive set of vocabulary flashcards covering the pioneering scientists, inventions, and fundamental concepts highlighted in the "History of Electronics" lecture.

Electronics

Branch of science and engineering that uses the controlled flow of electrons for information processing and power applications, generally regarded as beginning around 1900.

Electricity

Physical phenomenon involving the presence and motion of electric charge; foundational to later advances in electronics.

William Gilbert

16th-century scientist who wrote De Magnete and distinguished magnetism from static electricity.

De Magnete

1600 treatise by William Gilbert that systematically described magnetism and static electricity.

Leyden Jar

First capacitor, invented by Pieter van Musschenbroek, capable of storing static electric charge.

Capacitor

Electronic component that stores energy in an electric field; the Leyden Jar was the earliest example.

Benjamin Franklin

American scientist who defined positive and negative electrical charges and conducted famous kite experiments.

Charles Coulomb

French physicist who formulated Coulomb’s Law describing the electrostatic force between charges.

Coulomb’s Law

Law stating that the electrostatic force between two point charges is proportional to the product of the charges and inversely proportional to the square of their separation.

Luigi Galvani

Italian physician who discovered bioelectricity by studying the effect of electricity on frog muscles.

Alessandro Volta

Inventor of the first chemical battery, the Voltaic Pile, proving that electricity could be generated chemically.

Battery

Device that converts chemical energy into electrical energy; first practical form invented by Alessandro Volta.

Hans Christian Ørsted

Physicist who discovered that electric currents create magnetic fields, initiating the study of electromagnetism.

Electromagnetism

Interaction between electric currents and magnetic fields first demonstrated by Ørsted.

Aluminum

Chemical element discovered by Hans Christian Ørsted in 1825.

André-Marie Ampère

French scientist who studied current-carrying conductors and lent his name to the unit of electric current.

Solenoid

Coil of wire that generates a magnetic field when electric current passes through it; invented by Ampère.

Georg Simon Ohm

Physicist who established Ohm’s Law relating voltage, current, and resistance.

Ohm’s Law

Fundamental law stating V = I × R, where V is voltage, I is current, and R is resistance.

Michael Faraday

Experimentalist who discovered electromagnetic induction and introduced concepts of electric and magnetic fields.

Electromagnetic Induction

Production of an electromotive force across a conductor exposed to a changing magnetic field, discovered by Faraday.

James Prescott Joule

Scientist who formulated the Law of Conservation of Energy; the SI unit of energy (joule) is named after him.

Law of Conservation of Energy

Principle stating that energy cannot be created or destroyed, only converted from one form to another.

Gustav Kirchhoff

Physicist who devised Kirchhoff’s circuit laws and advanced spectroscopy.

Kirchhoff’s Laws

Two rules (current and voltage laws) governing the conservation of charge and energy in electrical circuits.

Sir Charles Wheatstone

Inventor and physicist known for the Wheatstone Bridge, early telegraph work, and concertina musical instruments.

Wheatstone Bridge

Bridge circuit used to precisely measure electrical resistance, developed by Wheatstone.

James Clerk Maxwell

Scottish physicist whose equations unified electricity, magnetism, and light in Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism (1873).

Maxwell’s Equations

Set of four fundamental equations that describe classical electromagnetism.

Heinrich Hertz

Physicist who experimentally confirmed electromagnetic waves predicted by Maxwell and observed the photoelectric effect.

Photoelectric Effect

Emission of electrons from a material when it absorbs light; first demonstrated by Hertz.

Wilhelm Röntgen

Discoverer of X-rays in 1895, enabling immediate medical imaging applications.

X-Rays

High-energy electromagnetic waves discovered by Röntgen and confirmed as electromagnetic in nature by Max von Laue.

Thomas Alva Edison

Prolific inventor with 1,093 patents, noted for the phonograph, incandescent lamp, kinetograph, and observation of the Edison effect.

Edison Effect

Thermionic emission of electrons from a heated filament, precursor to vacuum-tube technology.

Phonograph

First device to record and reproduce sound, invented by Edison.

Kinetograph

Early motion-picture camera invented by Edison, used to create the first films.

Nikola Tesla

Serbian-American engineer who developed AC generators, distribution systems, and the induction motor.

AC Induction Motor

Motor that operates on alternating current using electromagnetic induction; invented by Tesla.

Guglielmo Marconi

Italian inventor who patented radio telegraphy and sent the first transatlantic wireless signal in 1901.

Radio Telegraphy

Wireless transmission of telegraph signals, pioneered and commercialized by Marconi.

John Ambrose Fleming

Physicist who invented the Fleming Valve, the first practical vacuum-tube rectifier (diode).

Fleming Valve

Two-electrode vacuum tube used as the first electronic rectifier (diode) in 1904.

Lee de Forest

Inventor of the Audion tube, the first triode, enabling electronic amplification.

Audion Tube

Three-element (triode) vacuum tube invented by de Forest that could amplify electrical signals.

Walter Schottky

Physicist who defined shot noise and invented the multiple-grid vacuum tube.

Shot Noise

Random fluctuation in electric current due to discrete electron flow, characterized by Schottky.

Edwin Howard Armstrong

Inventor of regenerative feedback, the superheterodyne receiver, and FM radio.

Superheterodyne Receiver

Radio architecture invented by Armstrong that converts received signals to a fixed intermediate frequency for superior selectivity.

FM Radio

Wideband frequency-modulated radio system patented by Armstrong in 1933, providing high-fidelity sound.

Harold Stephen Black

Engineer who introduced negative feedback in amplifiers to reduce distortion (1927).

Negative Feedback

Technique of feeding a portion of an output signal back to the input in opposite phase to improve linearity and reduce distortion.

Philo Taylor Farnsworth

Inventor who created the first fully electronic television system and won patent disputes with RCA.

Electronic Television

Display technology that scans images electronically instead of mechanically; first conceived and patented by Farnsworth.

William Shockley

Co-inventor of the junction transistor and co-recipient of the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics.

Walter Brattain

Physicist on the Bell Labs team that fabricated the first working junction transistor.

John Bardeen

Theorist whose work on surface states enabled the junction transistor; shared the 1956 Nobel Prize with Shockley and Brattain.

Junction Transistor

Semiconductor device invented in 1947 that can amplify or switch electronic signals, foundational to modern electronics.