UFO UpDates Mailing List
From: James Easton <pulsar@compuserve.com> Date: Wed, 18 Jun 1997 19:39:46 -0400 Fwd Date: Thu, 19 Jun 1997 02:19:55 -0400 Subject: Re: Corso's book Regarding... >From: Greg Sandow <gsandow@prodigy.net> >Subject: Corso's book >Date: Tue, 17 Jun 1997 17:34:25 -0400 Greg wrote: >The key to Corso's UFO information is the title of the book -- "The >Day After Roswell." This refers to something initially quite limited, >and fascinating -- what happened to the crash debris. Corso says that >it initially got scattered scientific study, some of which led to the >development of the transitor. Greg, The development of the transistor was completed during 1947, by William Shockley, Walter Brattain and John Bardeen, working at Bell Telephone Laboratories. Briefly setting this in some perspective: John V. Atanasoff, a professor at Iowa State College, and Clifford Berry, a graduate student, conceived an all-electronic computer that applied Boolean algebra to computer circuitry. In 1939, they designed a prototype and in 1973, a judge declared it to be the first automatic digital computer. The code-breaking Colossus computer was designed and built in 1941 at the University of Manchester, England and Colossus Mark II followed in 1944. The first information-processing digital computer actually built was the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator, or Mark I computer. Completed in 1944, this electromechanical device was designed by American Howard H. Aiken, a Harvard engineer working with IBM. Around half the length of a football field and containing some 500 miles of wiring, its purpose was to create ballistic charts for the U.S. Navy. February of 1946 saw an unveiling of the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC), the result of a joint project between the U.S. government and the University of Pennsylvania. Consisting of 17,468 vacuum tubes, some 70,000 resistors and 5 million soldered joints, it weighed approximately 30 tons and required 1000 square feet of floor space. Entirely electronic, it consumed up to 160 kilowatts of power, sufficient to dim the lights in part of Philadelphia. Vacuum tubes were required for electromechanical circuit switching and the regulated conduction of electrical current - basically switching and amplification - but they consumed too much power, gave off too much heat, took up too much space, cost too much to produce, and they burned out. Shockley, Brattain and Bardeen's research addressed these problems and in searching for a suitable alternative they decided to try semiconductors, materials that were adequate, although not exceptional, conductors of electricity. Some time previously, while investigating the failure of radar diodes, they had noticed a "transistor effect" and suspected that small changes in current were taking place. They theorised that a suitable medium would produce active electronic effects and when they passed current through an N-type germanium crystal, they demonstrated the principle of amplifying an electrical current using a solid semiconducting material. Their concept was based on the fact that it is possible to selectively control the flow of electricity through silicon, designating some areas as current conductors and adjacent areas as insulators. The point-contact transistor amplifier became the building block for all modern electronics and the foundation for microchip and computer technology. >But then it languished, until the early '60s when Corso went to work >for a foreign technology unit of the army. [...] >If somebody's thinking is stimulated by a fragment of an alien TV >set, they still have to theorize and experiment to imitate the thing >-- and it's those theories and experiments that show up in published >data, not the inspiration for them. As for lasers and fibre (fiber) optics... Einstein is credited as the "Father" of the laser. In 1917, he theorised photons and stimulated emission and was awarded the Nobel prize for his work. The first microwave laser was with us in 1954 and projected a beam of ammonia molecules through a system of focusing electrodes. The first optical laser appeared in 1960, it's design based on a rod of ruby crystal which produced pulses of red light. In 1961, a laser based on a mixture of helium and neon gases was constructed and produced continuous output of red light. Shortly after the announcement of the first successful optical laser, other laboratories around the world successfully lased different substrates and as manufacturing techniques improved, lasers rapidly made the transition from the laboratory to commercial applications. The principle behind fibre optics dates back to antiquity and has been used for centuries in prisms and illuminated fountains. In 1870, Englishman John Tyndall demonstrated to the Royal Society that light travelled along a curved stream of water and in 1880, Scotsman Alexander Graham Bell took the concept further in his photophone experiment, which transmitted voice signals on beams of light. Bell shelved the idea, as there was too much interference with the light beam and the signals couldn't travel any meaningful distance. In 1926, another Scotsman, John Logie Baird, patented an early form of colour television which used glass rods to carry light. An idea ahead of its time, little progress was made until the 1950's when the first fibrescopes were developed. Although scientists were aware that optical fibre could transmit light, the transmission interference seemed to be an insurmountable problem and it wasn't until 1970 that Corning Glass researchers, Drs Robert Maurer, Donald Keck, and Peter Schultz designed and produced the first optical fibre which met the specification for wide use in telecommunications. The discovery by the Corning group was soon recognised as a breakthrough and led the way for the commercialisation of optical fibre as a revolution in telecommunications. These are all of course verifiable facts. James. E-mail: pulsar@compuserve.com
UFO UpDates - Toronto -
updates@globalserve.net
Operated by Errol Bruce-Knapp - ++ 416-696-0304
A Hand-Operated E-Mail Subscription Service for the Study of UFO Related
Phenomena.
To subscribe please send your first and last name to
updates@globalserve.net
Message submissions should be sent to the same address.
|
Link it to the appropriate Ufologist or UFO Topic page. |
Archived as a public service by Area 51 Research Center which is not
responsible for content.
Financial support for this web server is provided by the
Research Center Catalog.
Software by Glenn Campbell.
Technical contact:
webmaster@ufomind.com