返回列表 回复 发帖
cnnas

管理员

Rank: 9Rank: 9Rank: 9
1#
打印
tT
发表于 2009-4-13 11:39 | 只看该作者

5个改变世界的偶然发明

微波炉
5 Accidental Inventions That Changed The World
五个改变世界的偶然发明

微波炉、万能胶、青霉素、橡胶、安全玻璃，这些我们日常生活中已经离不开的东西都是偶然发明的。如今，这些发明已经改变了我们的生活方式。只要问一问这些东西的发明者，你便明白有时运气对一个人的成功有多重要。


1：微波炉 The Microwave Oven


微波炉



Above: a scientist, with robot. 发明微波炉的人


　　微波炉最早的名称是“爆米花和热团加热器”(Popcorn and Hot Pockets Warmer)，它的发明纯属偶然，源自一个武器研发项目。微波炉的发明者是美国自学成才的工程师珀西·勒巴朗·斯宾塞(Percy LeBaron Spencer)，二战爆发后，他在一家公司从事雷达技术开发。这项技术在当时听起来很像具有科幻色彩，其实只是一种具有探测功能的磁电管，可以发射高强度辐射光束。

　　显然，就像身边朋友给他起的外号，斯宾塞喜欢吃甜食。他或许还是个奇怪的盲目崇拜者。一天，他在实验室做实验时，一块巧克力棒粘在了短裤上。斯宾塞注意到，当他运行磁控管时，裤子上的巧克力棒融化了。一般人可能认为，是他身上的体温降巧克力融化，斯宾塞没有按照这种逻辑思维去判断这件事，相反，思维敏捷的他给出了一个更为科学的解释：肉眼看不见的辐射光线“将其煮熟了”。

　　任何一个理智的人此时都会停下来，因为这些神奇的辐射光线离斯宾塞阴囊很近。事实上，在场大多数军事专家可能就梦想将这些射线应用到战场上。但是，同科学史上每一位发明家一样，斯宾塞对他的发现充满了好奇，将其作为一种新奇事物看待。他利用这种装置让鸡蛋爆裂，还去烤爆米花。

　　斯宾塞继续实验磁电管，最后，他用箱子将其包装起来，作为一种烹饪美食的新工具推向市场。最早上市的微波炉大约有6英尺(约合1.8米)高，重达750磅(约合340公斤)，做必须用冷水冷却。在之后的岁月里，技术人员不断缩小微波炉的尺寸，今天，微波炉已成为我们日常生活中的一部分。


The microwave oven, aka the "Popcorn and Hot Pockets Warmer," was a happy accident that came from, of all things, a weapons program.

Percy LeBaron Spencer was a self-educated engineer working on radar technology in the years following WWII. The technology in question was the sci-fi sounding magnetron, a piece of machinery capable of firing high intensity beams of radiation.

Apparently, P.L.S., as some have called him, had a bit of a sweet tooth. Or a strange fetish. Either way, he had a candy bar in his pants while he was in the lab one day. The self-proclaimed engineer noticed that the chocolate bar had melted when he was working with the magnetron.

Spencer disregarded the simple idea that his body heat had melted the chocolate in favor of the less logical and therefore more scientific conclusion that invisible rays of radiation had "cooked it" somehow.


A sane man would stop at this point and realize these magical heat rays were landing just inches from his tender scrotum. Indeed, most of the military experts on hand probably dreamed of the battlefield applications of their new Dick-Melting Ray. But like all men of science, Spencer was fascinated and treated his discovery like a novelty. He used it to make eggs explode and pop kernels of corn ("Imagine, a future where a building full of workers in cubicles eat this all day!")


Spencer continued to experiment with the magnetron until he boxed it in and marketed it as a new way to cook food. The initial version of the microwave was roughly six feet tall, weighed in around 750 pounds and had to be cooled with water. But they got it down to size, and today we use it mostly to destroy random objects on YouTube.
收藏 分享 评分
大风车多媒体互动网络
回复 引用

订阅 TOP

cnnas

管理员

Rank: 9Rank: 9Rank: 9
2#
发表于 2009-4-13 11:43 | 只看该作者
2.万能胶 Krazy Glue and/or Super Glue


万能胶(Krazy Glue)


　　万能胶的发明还要追溯到1942年。发明者哈里·库弗(Harry Coover)博士当时供职于伊斯曼柯达公司，这是一家享誉全球的照相机及相关产品的知名企业。库弗博士的工作是隔离一种透明塑料，使武器瞄准器的精度更高。在二战期间，这种材料的用途很大。有一段时间，库弗非常沮丧，因为这种称为氰基丙烯酸酯的材料粘性太强了。

　　有一次，库弗一气之下将氰基丙烯酸酯扔到了窗外，接着继续挥汗如雨进行实验。此时，库弗完全没有意识到他已发明了有史以来粘性最强的万能粘合剂之一。具有讽刺意味的是，库弗用在瞄准镜上的功夫其实白费，因为美国两颗原子弹结束了这场战争，原子弹的爆炸辐射范围如此之广，根本不需要瞄准。

　　几年以后，库弗重新获得了本属于他的发明，体会到失而复得的狂喜。有人认为或许是库弗注意到过去盛放氰基丙烯酸酯的容器仍旧粘在垃圾桶底部，他想尽一切办法也不能将其取下来，这样，才发现了这种材料的神奇之处。1958年，库弗终于说服老板相信氰基丙烯酸酯蕴含的市场潜力，不久后柯达公司推出了一种名为“伊斯曼910”(Eastman 910)的胶水。

　　柯达绞尽脑汁去宣传这款产品，公司有人出了一个主意：用吊车将一辆轿车吊在街道上空，让人们误以为是使用“伊斯曼910”的结果。这一招果然收到奇效，人们将这种胶水称为“Krazy Glue”。“Krazy”其实是借用英文“疯狂”(crazy)的意思。“伊斯曼910”早期的广告宣传语是，“记住，在它完全在管子上凝固前，你只能用一次！”时至今日，万能胶仍是畅销产品。

The story goes that in 1942, Dr. Harry Coover was working for Eastman Kodak, a company renowned for cameras and camera-related things. His job was to find a plastic that could be used as a clear gunsight, since this was smack in the middle of WWII and everybody knew where the money was.

Coover got frustrated because the material, called cyanoacrylate, was just too damned sticky. Rather than noticing he accidentally made one of the most versatile adhesives of all time, he threw it away in a huff and continued sweating over gunsights for a war that would be ended, ironically, by two bombs with blast radiuses so big that they didn't even require sights at all.


Aim optional.

Years later, Coover would re-discover his invention, we prefer to think due to him noticing that old container of cyanoacrylate was still stuck to the bottom of his trash can and couldn't be removed by any means.

In 1958, after finally convincing his bosses that at the very least, there was enormous comedic potential in the prospect of a man getting his hand permanently stuck to his junk; Kodak released the glue with the catchy name "Eastman 910."

Somebody then decided to actually pay the marketing guys to do something, and they decided the best way to convince people to buy this new product was to suspend a car over a public street with a crane, supposedly held up only with the ol' 910.


Reactions resulted in the product being coined "Krazy Glue"; a product so crazy that it requires intentional misspelling. The early slogan, "Remember, you can only use it once before it completely solidifies in the tube!" was quickly dropped and it remains a top-selling product to this day.
大风车多媒体互动网络
回复 引用

TOP

cnnas

管理员

Rank: 9Rank: 9Rank: 9
3#
发表于 2009-4-13 11:45 | 只看该作者
3.硫化橡胶(Vulcanized Rubber)


　　硫化橡胶(Vulcanized Rubber)


"There's got to be a better way."开发出一种坚实耐用足以承受街头飙车和飞车追逐的橡胶，可不像现在一些人想象的那般轻而易举


　　如果你知道制造轮胎的橡胶是查尔斯·古德伊尔(Charles Goodyear)发明的，你或许并不感到吃惊，毕竟他是这个名单中首位名字与最终发明有联系的人——因为“库弗胶水”(Coover Glue)听上去更像是一种可憎的节育工具。在汽车刚发明出来的那个年月，开发出一种坚实耐用足以承受街头飙车和飞车追逐的橡胶，可不像现在一些人想象的那般轻而易举。

　　事实上，如果说有谁本应该放弃他一生的梦想，那么这个人就是古德伊尔。古德伊尔曾在监狱度过了一段时间，身边朋友一个个离去而去，他的几个孩子也都过着饥肠辘辘的日子。尽管如此，他仍在不知疲倦地追寻着自己的梦想。那是19世纪30年代，一个饥寒交迫的动荡年代。最初，古德伊尔对原始橡胶经过两年的研究，仍毫无成果，迫于生活压力，只好领着一家老小搬到一个废弃的工厂居住。

　　正是在这个工厂，古德伊尔获得了重大突破：他采用酸性物质消除橡胶的粗糙表面，令其变得坚实耐用。然而，在政府购买了150个由这种橡胶制作的邮袋后，这种袋子就没有再卖出去。它们都不同程度存在缺陷。古德伊尔再次陷入到孤立无援的绝境。终于，在1839年，好运降临到古德伊尔的头上。

　　那一年的某一天，在计算等式再次失败后，失落的古德伊尔独自一人走进一个杂货店。见到这位不修边幅的倒霉蛋，人们像遇见新奇的动物一样驻足观看，并对古德伊尔大加嘲笑。一怒之下，古德伊尔挥舞起拳头，他身上带着的一块橡胶此时恰好掉到滚烫的炉子里。古德伊尔在查看了烤焦的橡胶残骸后，他意识到自己终于发现了制造耐用、不受气候影响的橡胶的方法。从古德伊尔的事例，我们可以深深体会到失败是成功之母这句话的含义。古德伊尔的“轮胎帝国”由此诞生了。

You probably won't be shocked to find out that the inventor of tire rubber is Charles Goodyear, as he's the first guy on the list to actually get his name attached to the end product (since "Coover Glue" sounds like a gruesome form of birth control).

It wasn't easy coming up with a form of rubber tough enough to withstand the drag racing and car chases everyone envisioned the day the automobile was invented. In fact, if there was one man who should have given up his life dream, it was Goodyear. The man spent time in and out of prison, lost every friend he had and starved his children in his tireless pursuit of a stronger form of rubber.

It was the 1830s, a period of time known for sucking. After his first two years of tinkering and failing with primitive rubber, Goodyear and his family were camping out in an abandoned factory and fishing for sustenance. This is when he made a huge breakthrough: He'd use acid to smooth out and toughen rubber! The government bought 150 mailbags made of the stuff and the rest is...

Oh, wait. They were all defective. The process didn't work and Goodyear was ruined. Again.


Finally in 1839, probably after being struck by lightning and/or being pissed on by a pack of stray dogs, Goodyear wandered into a general store with another failure of a formula. The crowd watched. Then they laughed at him. In a rage, he began to shake his fist, flinging a piece of his rubber onto the hot stove top.

After inspecting the charred remains, he realized that he had just found a way to make durable, weatherproof rubber. Despite what we're sure were numerous failed "now let's try setting this on fire to see if it improves it!" experiments, an empire was born.
大风车多媒体互动网络
回复 引用

TOP

cnnas

管理员

Rank: 9Rank: 9Rank: 9
4#
发表于 2009-4-13 11:47 | 只看该作者
4.安全玻璃 Safety Glass



安全玻璃

安全玻璃的发明者、法国人爱德华·贝尼迪库斯(Edward Benedictus)是个样样皆通，样样稀松的人
　　安全玻璃是用于汽车和建筑物上的一种玻璃，具有良好的保障人身安全性能，几乎随处可见。按照常识，安全玻璃破碎时不会形成有尖锐棱角的颗粒，碎片也不飞溅，从而不会对人员造成伤害。安全玻璃的发明者、法国人爱德华·贝尼迪库斯(Edward Benedictus)是个样样皆通，样样稀松的人。在幸运地发明安全玻璃前，贝尼迪库斯已是个有着四重身份的名人——画家、作曲家、作家和化学家。

　　一天，贝尼迪库斯像克劳西欧探长一样，不小心将一个实验用的烧瓶从架子上碰落，听到它发出一声清脆的响声(我们可以想象他在听到破碎声时发出的惊讶)。贝尼迪库斯顺着梯子爬到下面，发现烧瓶虽已破碎，但并没有四分五散。在向助手谈起此事后，贝尼迪库斯才知道烧瓶里最近放过硝酸纤维素。硝酸纤维素是一种黏合剂，用于将破碎的玻璃粘在一起。

　　尽管贝尼迪库斯意识到他发现了什么，但他绝没想到这项发现会有这么重要。在对一连串可怕的车祸展开研究后，贝尼迪库斯获得了灵感，他发现这些车祸的受伤者一般都是被挡风玻璃碎片划伤的。之后，他开始潜心研究，最终在一天后发明了Triplex。第一次世界大战期间，防毒面具就取材于贝尼迪库斯的新发明。在发现这种材料经久耐用后，汽车产业开始制造Triplex挡风玻璃。

Safety glass is the glass that's used in cars and buildings and almost everywhere you look. The idea is that when it shatters, like when a bad guy goes through it back-first because you blasted him with a shotgun, it doesn't break into shards that can cut his skin on the way through. Frenchman, Edward Benedictus, was a jack-of-all-trades, er, Jaques-of-all-trades. Before stumbling across an incredible invention, Benedictus was already a classical quadruple threat. That is to say he was a painter, composer, writer and chemist.

One day, in a potentially Clouseau-like manner, Edward knocked a scientific flask off of a shelf and heard it crash to the ground (we like to imagine that he shouted "sacre bleu!" upon hearing the impact). When Benedictus climbed down from his ladder, he noticed that the flask was broken, but had not actually shattered.


After asking one of his aides about the incident, he found that the flask had recently contained cellulose nitrate, which acted as an adhesive and held the shattered pieces of glass together.

Artist's rendering of cellulose nitrate.

Though he knew he had something, Benedictus didn't really know what he had. Then inspiration struck in the form of a rash of horrifyingly gruesome car accidents. Benedictus noticed that the more horrific injuries from these crashes were due to flying shards of windshield.

Then he set to work until he eventually developed Triplex (not pronounced triple x). When we say eventually, we mean 24 hours later. After taking notice of the durability of his new invention in the gas masks of WWI, the automotive industry began making the Triplex windshield the standard, as angry, sledgehammer-wielding ex-girlfriends the world over can attest to.
大风车多媒体互动网络
回复 引用

TOP

cnnas

管理员

Rank: 9Rank: 9Rank: 9
5#
发表于 2009-4-13 11:48 | 只看该作者
5：青霉素(盘尼西林) Penicillin



青霉素(盘尼西林) Penicillin

以健忘闻名的生物学家亚历山大·弗莱明(Alexander Fleming)爵士虽是历史上最伟大的发明家之一
，却是个出了名的大懒汉。在因发明青霉素出名前，弗莱明偶尔实施了一项实验，这次实验的“素材”竟然是他不小心掉进玻璃培养皿的鼻涕。六年后，弗莱明再次用一个到处充斥着病菌的塑料盘子做实验。他没有清洗散落一地的脏碟子，就离开实验室去度假。

　　度假归来，弗莱明回到他的实验室，发现一只被他遗忘的玻璃培养皿被一种霉菌污染了，于是就把它扔进了附近的垃圾桶。按照他的个人习惯，在将玻璃培养皿扔进一个满是实验废物的箱子里后，弗莱明仍继续检查他的实验成功。或许，他已决定要将早前扔掉的香肠吃到肚子里。

　　最终，他在垃圾桶注意到霉菌杀死了周围的细菌。这种霉菌就是青霉素的基本形式，毋庸置疑，也是有史以来医学领域最重要的发现。青霉素是一种高效、低毒、临床应用广泛的重要抗生素。它的发明大大增强了人类抵抗细菌性感染的能力，带动了抗生素家族的诞生。数百万条生命得以获救。

As researchers go, Sir Alexander Fleming is one of the greats. But the man was a slob. Years before he became famous for discovering Penicillin, he accidentally conducted a study based around some snot of his that fell into a Petri dish.


Six years later, the good Mr. Phlegm-ing, as he was affectionately known, was once again working in the lab with a plastic dish filled with disease. The Doc (another nickname) left the lab for a weekend without cleaning the filthy dishes that were scattered around. If the scientific community is represented by the cast from Revenge of the Nerds (we know, huge stretch), then Fleming is "Booger"?

Fleming returned to his abandoned experiment after his holiday to find that the dishes had sprouted mold. Fleming tossed the dish into a nearby trashcan. As per his custom, he continued to inspect his experiment after throwing it into a container filled with lab waste. Maybe he had decided to eat that sausage he had thrown away earlier.

While there he noticed that the mold had killed off the bacteria around it. This mold turned out to be the basic form of Penicillin, arguably the most important discovery in the field of medicine ever. All science needed was for a man to come along who was so filthy that he actually would discover a form of filth that could kill other filth. Millions of lives were saved.
大风车多媒体互动网络
回复 引用

TOP

返回列表