EP 46 · 9:26

Electromagnetic self-induction

From America 250: The Breakthroughs That Built American Science — Part 1

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In this chapter

Joseph Henry's work on self-induction helps explain why a changing electrical current can produce a voltage in the same circuit. Krishna Choudhary and Lester Nare discuss the connection between electricity and magnetism and how these experiments helped lay the groundwork for later electrical technologies.

  1. 01

    A changing current changes the magnetic field around a circuit.

  2. 02

    Self-induction produces a voltage that opposes the change in current.

  3. 03

    The discussion connects early electromagnetic experiments with later electrical technologies.

Transcript

246 words · auto-generated from the episode video

9:29discovery of electromagnetic selfinduction. >> Yes. This is physicist Joseph Henry. He discovered the phenomenon of electric self-induction at the college of New Jersey. >> See uh the TCJ uh which uh >> in Princeton, New Jersey, which now is called Princeton University. >> Um and so, you know, when we go to Princeton, the you know, first campus center, it says um Palmer Physics Lab, but there inside there's like the Joseph Henry Laboratories. That's why it's named after him. He was the first um professor of science at Princeton University. He discovered this thing that you know changing electric current in a coil generates an opposing

10:09electromotive force. So there's an opposing force to that current. This is essential for future technologies like the AC current that Tesla is renowned for. It's essential for things like the telegraph which America invented which we're going to get to later on. So this was this was a huge thing and this sort of established American physics on the global stage >> which at that time had been dominated by Europe. Yeah. Um and and is an important thing. What we're going to see throughout this is that all of these things begin to compound on each other which is why momentum and continuity really matters. Moving to 1839, the

10:50vulcanization of natural rubber. >> Yes. Charles Goodyear. >> Goodyear from Goodyear tires. your tires. >> He discovered the process of vulcaniz of vulcanizing rubber in Wurn,

From the episode
  1. EP 46

    America 250: The Breakthroughs That Built American Science — Part 1

    Part one of our America 250 special traces the inventions, institutions, and scientific breakthroughs — from Franklin to Sputnik — that helped build the United States into a global scientific power.

    America 250: The Breakthroughs That Built American Science — Part 1

America 250History of Science