151 World’s Greatest Inventions

Since his birth Max Planck (23 April, 1858–4 October, 1947) had a passion for music. There were a number of musical instruments that he seemed to have simply mastered upon. But when it came to choosing a profession, he chose Physics and went on to become a leading German Theoretical physicist. He got his Doctorate […]

Jacques E. Brandenberger (19 October, 1872–13 July, 1954) invented cellophane in 1908. Cellophane was used to forbid stains as well as for different parts of eye shells and gas marks. He was a chemist and textile engineer by profession. He completed his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Berne in 1895. After so many

Invented by Gideon Sundback and named by the B.F. Goodrich Company, the modern zipper came into existence in the year 1917. The history of the zipper dates back to 1851 when Elias Howe created the Automatic, Continuous Clothing Closure, which he did not market. So in 1893, Whitcomb actually invented the zipper that looked like

No doubt, ‘zero’ means none but still it is one of the most important numbers in maths because without it calculation can be done but not so easy as it is done now. There is a controversy regarding the invention of zero. According to a few people before Aryabhatta, zero was in existence in Babylonian

Xerography is also termed as electrophotography. It is a process where dry photocopying is done using the attractive forces of electric charges in order to transfer the image. An American patent lawyer named Chester Carlson born in Seattle, Washington, had a deep desire to invent something great. He invented xerography in the late 1930s. As

X-rays are basically a form of electromagnetic radiation that allows to look inside a body without cutting open. Wilhelm Rontgen, a German physicist, is generally given the credit for having invented X-rays. He was the first person to have studied the details of X-rays minutely and also observed the effects of them. In fact, he

The first kind of water heater was said to have been incepted by British painter Benjamin Waddy Maughan, who in 1868 invented the first instantaneous domestic water heater, which did not make use of solid fuel. The invention worked via means of hot gases originating from a burner at the bottom, which heated the cold

The washing machine is an electrically operated machine used to clean clothes, towels, sheets, etc. The rotary washing machine was invented in 1850s by Hamilton Smith. At early 1930, electricity was not available. That time, the washing machine was operated by a low-speed single cylinder gasoline engine. Earlier, there was one more machine called a

The creation of the wheeled furniture as it was in its nascent stage dates back to the 6th century BC. The first recorded wheeled seats, which were used for the purpose of the transport of the disabled, date back to 3 centuries back in China. However, the Chinese did not distinguish this creation for the

Velcro or the hook-loop fastener was invented and conceptualized by Georges de Mestral in Commugny, Switzerland, in the year 1948. He found the idea in the year 1941, when he was returning with his dog from a hunting trip in the Alps. He checked the seeds/burrs that kept sticking to his clothes, as well as,

An electron tube, also called ‘vacuum tube’, is an equipment used for controlling the flow of electrons through a vacuum in a sealed container. It’s usually made of a thin transparent glass in a cylindrical shape. It is said that the vacuum tube was first invented by John A. Fleming although with the help of

What we today know as the video game was initially patented as ‘cathode ray tube amusement device’ by two very profound inventors Estle Ray Mann and Thomas Goldsmith Jr. on 14 December, 1948, in the US. The invention of this device was in the later months of 1947 though. However, this amusement device did not

The first instances of toothpaste were known to have been developed in ancient Egypt, between 3000 and 5000 BC. The Egyptian version of toothpaste comprised many abrasives including powdered ashes from oxen hooves, myrrh, egg shells and pumice. Water was added to the powder to make paste. To scrape off plaque more effectively, the Greeks

The first TV remote control, called ‘Lazy Bones’, was developed in 1950 by Zenith Electronics Corporation. Lazy Bones used a cable that ran from the TV-set to the viewer. In 1956, Zenith’s Dr. Robert Adler suggested using ‘ultrasonic’s’, that is, high-frequency sound, beyond the range of human hearing.  In 1955, the Flash-o-Matic was invented. A

The invention story of the transistor starts with the inception of thermionic triode. The triode invented in 1907 acted as a precursor for transistors. Initially used in radio and telephone, these triodes were quite fragile and power-consuming. In the year 1925, Julius Edgar Lilienfeld manufactured Field Effect Transistor as a replacement for triode. In the