December 1961 Radio-Electronics
[Table of Contents]
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics.
See articles from Radio-Electronics,
published 1930-1988. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
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News Briefs
Smithsonian Honors First Plane Radio Operator
A bust of Elmo Neale Pickerill, the first person to transmit radio signals from
a plane to earth, has been installed at the Smithsonian Institution National Air
Museum. Mr. Pickerill learned to fly under Orville Wright, for the purpose of attempting
the wireless transmission.
During his historic flight on Aug. 4, 1910, he communicated with a portable ground
station at Manhattan Beach, N. Y., from an air position above Mineola, 20 miles
away. He also established two-way communication with the Marconi stations at Sagaponack
and Sea Gate, also on Long Island, N. Y., the marine station of United Wireless
Telegraph and five steamships in the area. Using a 200-foot wire trailing from one
wing tip as antenna, and a second one from the other wing tip as an "artificial
ground," Mr. Pickerill also laid to rest fears that airplane transmission could
not be practical because of the impossibility of making a good ground.
The presentation to the museum was made by Mr. Pickerill himself, who is now
77 and lives at Mineola. The bust was commissioned and presented to Mr. Pickerill
in 1939 by his friend Augustus Post, a New York financier, and one of the founders
of the Early Birds Association, in recognition of his services to radio and aviation.
Gallium Arsenide Diode May Do Maser's Work
According to scientists of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a gallium
arsenide diode, emitting very powerful radiation in an exceedingly narrow range
of frequencies near the visible light spectrum, may do many of the things now proposed
for optical masers (lasers). The high power and narrow bandwidth of the energy from
the diode, and the very high speed with which it responds to a change in the input
signal, make it seem especially adaptable to such work. The diode was pictured on
page 60 of last month's issue, although little information on it was available at
that time. Equipment has already been devised that will transmit 20 TV channels
or 20,000 voice channels on a single beam of intense infrared. The new device was
developed by R. J. Keyes and T. M. Quist of MIT's Lincoln Laboratory, Solid State
Division, with the joint support of the Armed Forces.
A tiny gallium arsenide crystal, the size of a pin-head, mounted near the
bottom end of the black rod (seen through the circular window) generates a modulated
infrared beam with an intensity up to 2,500 watts per cm2.
Now - Magnetic Glass
Now that we have become used to conductive glass, an optically transparent glass
that is ferro-magnetic at room temperatures has been produced. The new material,
developed by Semi-Elements, Inc., Saxonburg, Pa., is called Ferro-glass. It is expected
to have important applications in thermomagnetic devices, microwave circulators,
antennas, transformer cores, memory devices, cryogenic control, applications in
corrosive atmospheres, laser-modulation usage and applications in space equipment.
It could be particularly valuable in magnetic research, where it would be desirable
to be able to observe the specimens.
The new glass is not cheap (at least as yet). Experimental quantities are said
to cost from $135 up for 1 cc.
Van Allen Warns of Danger in Electron Belt
The high-altitude nuclear test staged in the Central Pacific last summer has
"increased the potential danger for man's space flights," according to Dr. James
A. Van Allen. The new belt, consisting largely of high-energy electrons, is about
400 miles deep and 4,000 miles wide, stretching around the middle of the earth on
the geomagnetic equator.
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