検索キーワード： 制作 "Hourly History" 科学・テクノロジー

Thomas Edison passed on many decades ago, but his inventions still echo loudly through time. If you watch TV, listen to your favorite songs, or simply click on the lamp next to your bed, it was Thomas Edison who brought all of these innovations into the world. Inside you will hear about Edison's early life, the electric light, the war of the currents, other inventions and projects, his final years and death, Edison's legacy, and much more.

Galileo Galilei began his career as a mathematician. Yet as fate would have it, he became far more than a numbers whiz. Here was a true Renaissance man; one who was greatly educated and a genuine lover of the arts. He was a fan of poets and a fine lute player. When in 1609 Galileo created his first telescope and turned his attention to the skies, everything changed.

In 1963, Stephen Hawking was diagnosed with motor neuron disease and given two years to live. More than half a century later, Hawking had made some of the most significant contributions to our understanding of the universe since Albert Einstein. The world’s most famous physics professor, a best-selling author, and a father of three, Stephen lived his life to its fullest. Bridging the world of theoretical physics with the reach of pop culture, Stephen Hawking became an emblem of human determination and intellectual curiosity.

Robert Oppenheimer had a lot resting on his shoulders. During the Second World War, he was tasked with directing the development of the world’s first nuclear arsenal. Known as the Manhattan Project, this super-secretive wartime project had the stoic visage of Oppenheimer overseeing the greatest experiment ever conducted by humankind. Much had happened in Oppenheimer’s life to lead him to this point, and much would subsequently take place after, but this moment was indeed the pinnacle of his career and his life.

Neil Armstrong is often referred to as an American hero for his service both as an astronaut and a veteran of the US Armed Forces, but in truth, Armstrong isn’t just America’s hero—he’s a global one.

Rosalind Franklin was what can only be called an overlooked genius. Although she was not fully credited for the feat at the time, her work led to major breakthroughs in our understanding of DNA. In fact, she took the first X-ray photo of DNA in all of its double helix glory. By the time her former colleagues were being showered with accolades for results they made at least partially based on her findings, Franklin would not be around to see it. Sadly, it’s believed that her use of X-ray equipment gave her terminal cancer, cutting her life short at age 37.

Alfred Nobel began his career as a distinguished inventor, but his inventions often failed to bring him the peace of mind he craved. One invention in particular - explosive dynamite - left him full of regret. He knew that it wouldn’t be long before his creation would be used to hurt others, and for this, he felt awful. As part of his final act in life, he would seek to vindicate himself as well as the rest of the world as he pursued the establishment of what would become the Nobel Prize. This is the story of the man who brought us that prize and so much more.

James Clerk Maxwell was a brilliant mathematician and scientist, but his impact on this world goes even deeper than that. Maxwell singlehandedly overturned what was believed to be fact with a whole new outlook on fundamental aspects of the universe. Maxwell is often credited as one of the first pioneers of quantum physics and rightly so....

Educator. Innovator. Inventor. These three words sum up Alexander Graham Bell, one of the greatest scientific men of his era. He is most famous for the invention of the telephone, a device which he predicted would transform human society. And it did. But the telephone is just one of the many innovations and inventions that Bell brought into being. A man who epitomizes the word visionary, Alexander Graham Bell predicted the use of light as a medium for transmitting information and how humanity would be transformed by flight. This is his story.

One man has probably done more good and saved more lives than any single public official of the Victorian era. The man being described was an engineer, city planner, bridge builder, and landscape architect; his name was Sir Joseph Bazalgette. Probably best remembered as the man who designed the London sewer network, he almost single-handedly eliminated virulent epidemics and changed the River Thames from an open sewer into one of the cleanest urban rivers in the world. He also transformed the face of London forever.

Step into the world of Albert Einstein in this book and find out what was so extraordinary about him. Find out why Einstein valued creativity and freedom as the foundation stones of a good life, and how these two traits would inspire him and help to transform the world as it was known up until then.

Isaac Newton seemed to be a most unwanted child of the world. Ignored by his mother, scorned by contemporaries, seemingly at war with the world in which he lived, Newton turned his energies to things unseen. His laws of motion and law of universal gravitation would set the stage for a most extraordinary life. Follow along as you travel from a rugged stone farmhouse to Trinity College, Cambridge to the halls of London exhibitions where Newton found himself the celebrity of the age. Looking back on Aristotle, and inspired by all that Galileo had brought the world, Newton made his life work much of what is heralded as the modern age. He saw what no one else did, and his vision saw into the universe. See how he did it, and why.

This audiobook takes a closer look at who Charles Darwin was, how he lived his everyday life and how influential he became; not just in his own day but into the modern world as well. Find out what interested his incredible mind and how Darwin presented his theories to a yet unsuspecting world. From beetles to butterflies, coral reefs and tropical islands, from apes to humans, learn how Charles Darwin's evidence speaks even to the world today.

George Stephenson is one of the world’s most famous engineers. His pioneering work on steam-powered locomotion would supercharge the industrial revolution in the United Kingdom and help bring about the heyday of the British Empire.

Nikola Tesla was a major figure in the world in which he lived. As the 19th century gave way to the 20th, it was Tesla who would contribute to some of the world's most amazing inventions. It was Tesla's theories, patents, and experiments that would pave the way for the digital, wireless world we are so familiar with today. Tesla didn't enjoy the high honors bestowed on so many of his contemporaries, yet he enjoyed the power of knowing that it was his inventions that were powering the world, literally.

Founding Father Benjamin Franklin came from humble beginnings to take his place in the annals of history as one of the most celebrated Americans ever to stand on the world stage. The Boston apprentice who ran away because of his brother's ill-treatment found his destiny in Philadelphia, where he became a printer, a scientist, an author, an inventor, a politician, and a citizen of the world. His inventions and his philosophies had the same ultimate goal - to make the world a better place - and Franklin achieved that goal.

Michael Faraday is regarded as one of the founding fathers of modern physics. His work in the field of electromagnetism revolutionized society, leading to new avenues of study and developments of technology that would leave the world changed forever. Without Faraday’s discoveries, there would be no electronics or electrical power. There would be no technology as we recognize it, or at the very least those technologies would have taken much longer to arise, causing our time to look very different.

Whether advocating for the peaceful use of nuclear energy or mentoring the next generation of scientists, Bohr’s influence extended far beyond his laboratory. Here in this book, we explore both his life and his life’s work in full.

Werner Heisenberg was one of the greatest physicists of all time. He probed the depths of not just science but the nature of our very existence. His groundbreaking work in quantum mechanics, particularly the formulation of the uncertainty principle, revolutionized our understanding of the subatomic world and earned him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1932.