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Invention of the Lamp (Part 2)
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While Yablochkov and several other inventors were improving the arc light, some engineers were working along entirely different lines1. They sought to develop an incandescent lamp2. Among them were Professor Jobard in Belgium, Sir William Grove in England, De Changy in France, and Professor Farmer in the United States. Nevertheless, it was a young Russian engineer, Alexander Lodygin, who made the first successful incandescent lamp. On July 11, 1873, he demonstrated it on one of the squares in St. Petersburg. The lamp consisted of an air-tight bulb3 with a graphite rod inside connected to two ends of a thick copper wire. When a current was passed through the lamp, the graphite first burned, using up the oxygen in the bulb, and then continued to glow in the oxygen-free atmosphere of the bulb for another hour.
Lodygin has succeeded where many other inventors had failed. He was later able to extend the lifetime of his graphite filament4, and in 1875–1876 his lamp emerged from the laboratory. The following year, in 1877, a Russian officer showed Lodygin's lamp to the famous American inventor Thomas Edison. Edison, with his usual energy, set to work improving the lamp and later patented an incandescent lamp with a carbon filament. However, even an American court ruled that Edison was not the inventor of the incandescent lamp, and this is also stated in the Encyclopedia Britannica, the most authoritative work of reference in the Anglo-Saxon world5.
And it was again Lodygin who made another important improvement in the incandescent lamp. In 1890 he invented a lamp with a molybdenum filament and, shortly afterwards, a lamp with a tungsten filament6, the lamp we use today.
In the twentieth century there have also been new advances in the gas-discharge lamp, which owes its origin to Petrov's discovery of the electric arc. The gas-discharge lamp, in turn, has led to the luminescent lamp, an achievement based in no small measure7 on the research of Sergei Vavilov, who was the President of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR until his death in 1951.
The luminescent lamp is a 'cold' artificial daylight lamp8. The tube of the lamp is filled with mercury vapour9. When an electric current is passed through the tube, the mercury vapour gives off invisible ultraviolet rays. But the tube is coated inside with special substances, which produce a bright light when irradiated with ultraviolet rays. Artificial daylight lamps are much cheaper than incandescent lamps and last much longer. This is the lighting of the future.
In the story of the lamp we have seen the long history of man's sources of light from the torch to the luminescent lamp and have seen how big a contribution Russian inventors made to the development of modern lamps.
Примечания
1. were working along entirely different lines – работали в совершенно ином направлении;
2. an incandescent lamp – лампочка накаливания;
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3. consisted of an air-tight bulb – состояла из герметического баллона;
4. graphite filament – нить накала из графита;
5. the most authoritative work of reference in the Anglo-Saxon world – самый авторитетный справочный труд в англо-саксонском мире;
6. a molybdenum filament – молибденовая нить; a tungsten filament – вольфрамовая нить;
7. in no small measure – в немалой степени;
8. a 'cold' artificial daylight lamp – "холодная" лампа дневного света;
9. mercury vapour – пары ртути.
Задания по тексту "Invention of the Lamp"
I. Найдите в тексте английские эквиваленты для следующих слов:
свеча, гальванические элементы, лампа накаливания, источник, вклад, преуспеть, просто, прожектор, сажа, нить накала, фонарь, сделать открытие, фитиль, освещать, искусственный, регулировка, переменный ток, однако, происхождение, яркий, достижение.
II. Дайте определения следующим английским словам:
Ø подберите определения к словам из данного списка:
wick, lantern, filament, incandescent, discover, searchlight, soot.
o producing a bright light when heated;
o a very thin thread or wire;
o a long piece of material in an oil lamp, that sucks up oil so that the lamp can burn;
o a very bright electric light that turns in any direction;
o a lamp consisting a metal container with glass sides that surrounds a flame or light;
o to find out that something exists;
o black powder that is produced when something is burnt;
Ø напишите по-английски определения для следующих слов:
adjustment, succeed, artificial, contribution, illuminate, advance.
III. Ответьте на вопросы к тексту.
When did the primitive lamp disappear?
What was in fact the first searchlight?
Who was the first to discover the electric arc?
Why did his discovery remain unknown in the West?
What was the subject of Yablochkov's report to the Paris Academy in 1876?
Who made the first successful incandescent lamp?
Can you explain the difference between his lamp and Edison's one?
What kind of filament is used nowadays?
What achievement was based on the research of S. Vavilov?
What are advantages of the artificial daylight lamps?
Text 4
Выпишите значения данных слов, пользуясь словарём; выучите их наизусть. Обратите внимание на их произношение:
bulb, melt, glass, towards, thread, loop, mould, furnace, attribute, baggage car, numerous, save.
Thomas Alva Edison
Thomas Alva Edison was born on February 11, 1847, in Milan, Ohio. He began to work when he was twelve years old. His first job was a newspaper boy on a train. The newspaper boy soon decided to produce his own newspaper; he published it in the baggage car. He also had a small laboratory there for carrying out different experiments.
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One day Edison saved the life of a child playing on the railway. The farther of a child, a telegraphist, gave Edison lessons in telegraphy, and the next five years he worked as a telegraphist in various cities of the United States and Canada. He spent all his free time experimenting, he sometimes conducted thousands of experiments to obtain necessary results. Many of Edison's most important inventions were made at his laboratory at Menlo Park, New Jersey, twenty five miles from New York City.
Once Edison become interested in the invention of an electric-light bulb for lighting streets and buildings by electricity instead of by gas. First he learned that platinum wire, which would melt in the open air and give a light of five candle-power1 would give a light twenty-five candle-power and burn a little longer in an all-glass bulb. This vacuum bulb was Edison's first real step towards his success.
In trying to find a small carbon conductor2 which could last for a long time the inventor had carbonized a lot of various things. One day he took a cotton thread, made a loop out of it and placed it in a nickel mould, which then was placed in the furnace. He then fitted it into a pear-shaped glass bulb, pumped out the air, turned on the current, and watched to see for how long it would burn. It burnt for forty-five hours. "If it will burn forty-five hours, there is no reason why it should not burn for a hundred hours", thought Edison. It took him and his assistants thirteen months to produce the incandescent lamp3.
Edison's inventions include the phonograph, or gramophone, the megaphone, the improved lamp of incandescent light, many greatly improved systems of telegraphic transmission and numerous other ones.
This great scientist continued working all through his long life and attributed his success not so much to genius as to hard work – " Ninety-eight per cent perspiration and two per cent inspiration " 4, as he liked to say.
Примечания
Ø light of five candle-power – свет силой в пять свечей;
Ø carbon conductor – углеродный проводник;
Ø incandescent lamp – лампа накаливания;
Ø ninety-eight per cent perspiration and two per cent inspiration – девяносто восемь процентов труда и два процента вдохновения.
Задания по тексту "Томас A лва Эдисон"
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