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 Previous: FCC Amateur Radio Enforcement Letters for the Period Ending August 2, 2006 |  Next: ARRL Board Designates Award Winners |
By James H. Seaton, W1FWE
August 3, 2006
Although not as well known as his contemporaries, Oliver W. Heaviside is present in everything we do in Amateur Radio. He was a man who defined terms that we as ham radio operators toss about, and changed the face of mathematics and science for years to come.
I'll bet you would like to meet the man who gave us such electrical terms as electret, inductance, reluctance, conductance, impedance, permittance (later called susceptance) and permeability admittance.
 Oliver W. Heaviside, 1850-1925 |
Oliver W. Heaviside is gone now, but I ran across an interesting article about him in the June 1990 issue of Scientific American by P. J. Nahan. Heaviside was born on May 18, 1850, in Camdentown, a section of London, England. Interestingly, he was a nephew of the famous Charles Wheatstone, of the Wheatstone (electrical) Bridge fame.
Unfortunately, Heaviside came down with scarlet fever, leaving him partially deaf. Even with this handicap, he became a good telegraph operator while quite young, just as Thomas Edison had been, again with the same basic handicap! As a schoolboy, Heaviside was good in everything except geometry, which he failed. He quit school at age 16 because of this one embarrassing failure.
A Mathematics Pioneer
Although he did not have a university education, Heaviside studied mathematics on his own. Eventually this mathematical curiosity led him to the study of Maxwell's Equations, which had become the latest rage. In fact, he spent over three years studying them.
As presented by James Clerk Maxwell,
those equations consisted of 20 equations in 20 unknowns. This was because
Maxwell presented each component of each vector or force. Working full time
between 1886 and 1889, Heaviside managed to reduce Maxwell's original work down
to just the four equations we commonly see today in textbooks. As a result of
this gigantic work (1891), he was elected as "Fellow" of the Royal Society (FRS), quite
a prestigious award for a high school drop-out!
 Heaviside with his bike, ca 1900. |
During this period, Heaviside also adapted complex numbers for use in electric circuits, as well as developed techniques for applying Laplace Transforms for the solution of differential equations.
Although Heaviside reformulated Maxwell's Equations in terms of electric and magnetic forces and energy flux/flow, his explanation turned out to be not quite as "clear" as was that of the famous scientist Heinrich Hertz; however, in small print Hertz admitted that his ideas came from Oliver Heaviside.
Algebra is "Simple"
Along the way, Heaviside co-invented vector analysis calculus.
He also formulated the "operator" method for use in linear differential equations.
He even replaced the differential operator (d/dx) by a new variable (p),
transforming a differential equation into an algebraic equation, which is much
easier to solve. This simple solution to an algebraic equation can then be
transformed back into a differential equation solution by using "tables of
conversion," which are already worked out. He thus allowed us to solve
difficult differential equations through the use of easier algebraic methods. Along
the way, he also "coined" all those electrical terms we still use today.
 A portion of the ionosphere, the E layer, is also called the Heaviside layer. It is between approximately 95 and 130 kilometers above the surface of the Earth, between the D and F layers. Heaviside is credited with predicting its existence. |
 A copy of Heaviside's obituary that appeared in The London Times. |
In 1902, he predicted a "layer" of the earth's atmosphere could refract radio waves. We now call this layer the ionosphere. His prediction neatly explained how Marconi had famously managed to send the first ever radio signal across the Atlantic Ocean the previous year. For years, this ionized layer in our atmosphere was called the "Heaviside Layer." Its existence and predicted ability to refract certain high frequencies was finally proven in 1924, just one year before his death in 1925.
Famous and Not-so-Famous "Electrical Wizards"
Heaviside was never quite accepted by polite society, however, as he evidently was prone to some anti-social behavior. He was reportedly hard to get along with, and would typically tell co-workers off if they could not understand him. This perhaps partially explains why the name Oliver W. Heaviside is not as commonly known today as some other "electrical wizards" of the period.
For his work, Oliver Heaviside was presented the very first Faraday Medal. But sadly, on February 3, 1925, he died in Paignton, Devon, England, in total poverty and as a recluse. So you can clearly see that as we tinker with our electrical circuits today, we have a lot of thanks to give to a not-so-famous electrical wizard, Oliver Heaviside.
James H. Seaton, W1FWE, is an Amateur Extra class licensee;
he has been a ham since 1957. He holds a BSEE and an MS in Nuclear Engineering
from Purdue University, and is a retired operations research analyst for the US Submarine Force. James is especially interested in QRP operations. He lives in Ledyard, Connecticut.
| Previous: FCC Amateur Radio Enforcement Letters for the Period Ending August 2, 2006 | Next: ARRL Board Designates Award Winners |
