I.

INTRODUCTION

In this monograph, I will present a little about the history of the great researcher and scientist
Nikola Tesla. I choose this good character because he was a great mechanical engineer and
engineer in energy, his life is very interesting for me since I am currently studying the professional
career of mechanical engineering.

Now, Nikola Tesla as we know little attention has been given to his research and his contributions
to the world in general. I would like to tell you about him to know more about his past and to know
the reason for his small reference in books and merits.

The researches that Nikola Tesla carried out were and continue to be of great help for the modern
world and that is what I would like do when I finished my professional career.

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 II. DEVELOPMENT

1. BIOGRAPHY

Nikola Tesla was the son of Serbian parents in the town of Smiljan in the Austro-Hungarian
Empire, which belongs to the territory of present-day Croatia. He was born on July 10, 1856. His
father was named Milutin Tesla, a priest of the Orthodox Church, and his mother's name was Đuka
Mandici, a housewife, who devoted part of her time as a self-taught scientist to the development
of small homes home appliances.

He began his studies in electrical engineering at the University of Graz in 1875. While studying
the uses of alternating current. Some sources claim that he graduated from the University of Graz,
however, the university claims that he did not receive any degree and that he did not continue
beyond the second semester of the third year, during which he stopped attending classes. In
December of 1878 left Graz and stopped to relate with his relatives. His first job as an engineering
assistant was in Maribor, (now Slovenia) where he stayed for a year. During this period he suffered
a nervous breakdown.

Tesla was later persuaded by his father to attend the University of Carolina in Prague, which he
attended during the summer of 1880. There he was influenced by Ernst Mach. However, after his
father died, he left the university.

In 1880, he moved to Budapest to work under Tivadar Puskás in a telegraph company, by the time
the telephone exchange opened in 1881 in Budapest, Tesla had become the company's chief
electrician, and was later engineer of the first telephone system of the country.

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 2. TRANSMISSION OF ELECTRIC POWER WITHOUT CABLES

A "global system for the transmission of electric power without cables" based on the electrical
conductivity of the earth, was proposed by Tesla, which would function by the transmission of
energy by several natural means and the subsequent use of the transmitted current between the two
Points to power electrical devices.

Tesla claimed to have demonstrated wireless transmission of energy in early 1891. However, it
was never able to implement it efficiently.

3. EXPERIMENTS WITH X-RAYS

In 1894, Tesla began investigating what were later called x-rays. In the fire of his laboratory in
1895 all his work was lost, Tesla said. Meanwhile, in November of that same year, the German
scientist Wilhelm Röntgen concluded his extensive and systematic investigation of the X-rays,
publishing his conclusions in 1895. Tesla's first publication on "rays of Rontgen" dates from 1895.

According to Tesla himself narrates, used his own vacuum tube (similar to his patent). This device
differed from other X-ray tubes because it did not have a receiving electrode. The modern term for
the phenomenon produced by this device is Bremsstrahlung (or braking radiation).

In his first investigations, Tesla designed some experiments to produce x-rays. He said that with
these circuits, "the instrument will be able to generate Roentgen rays of greater power than that
obtained with ordinary devices."

He also mentioned the dangers of working with their circuits and the x-rays produced by their
single-node devices. Of many of his notes in the preliminary investigations of this phenomenon,
attributed the damage of the skin to several causes.

He believed that initially the damage could not be caused by Roentgen's rays, but by the ozone
generated on contact with the skin and partly also with nitrous acid. He thought these were
longitudinal waves, like those produced by waves in plasmas.

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 4. RELATIONSHIP WITH THOMAS ALVA EDISON

He had a relationship in constant competition over his superiority and the main thing is the War of
the Currents between his two patents, both wanted to make known that his theory was the best one
doing a battle between Westinghouse Electric vs General Electric, being thus Westinghouse
Electric by Part of Nikola Tesla and Alva Edison with General Electric.

Edison and Tesla clashed in a public relations battle - which newspapers called "war of the
currents" - to determine what system would become the dominant technology. Harold Brown
(Edison's employee) collaborated on the invention of the AC electric chair and electrocuted dogs,
cats and even an elephant to show that AC power was dangerous.

The electrocution of the elephant Topsy was recorded in a film filmed in 1903.

5. THE CURRENT WAR

The War of the Currents was an economic and technological competition produced in the 1880s,
due to the control of the incipient market of the generation and distribution of electric energy.

Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison became opponents due to the promotion of direct current Edison
and JP Morgan created General Electric for the distribution of electric power and that in turn was
against the eternal current defended by George Westinghouse and Nikola Tesla.

Despite the popularity of Edison and his discoveries and inventions was the alternating current
propelled by Tesla which prevailed for the distribution of electricity from then until today.

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 Picture 01: Elocuent, Thomas and Nikola WAR OF CURRENTS

6. UNAVAILABLE INVESTIGATIONS AND DISCOVERIES

Tesla had a lot of input and research, but the main one is his theory of alternating current, this is
about bringing energy and electricity without the need for cables. Among his outstanding
contributions we have:

• Bulb without filament or fluorescent lamp.

• Electrotherapy or diagnostic devices, especially a single-electrode X-ray

generator. There is also a patent record of an ozone generator.

• Turbine without pallets, operated by the friction of the fluid.

• Tesla coil: delivering high voltage and high frequency energy at the output.

• Theoretical principles of radar.

• Wireless transfer of electrical energy by means of electromagnetic waves.

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 Picture 02: Nikola Teslas’s Laboratory

7. AWARDS AND HONOURS

Although the Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to Marconi for the invention of radio in 1909,
the press reported that Edison and Tesla would share the Nobel Prize in 1915. Edison tried to
minimize Tesla's accomplishments and refused to share the Prize, in case it was shared. Some
sources claimed that due to Edison's envy none gained it, despite their great contributions to
science. Earlier, it was said that Tesla could be nominated for the Nobel Prize of 1912.

The nomination was possibly due to its tuned circuits using resonant transformers of high tension
and high frequency. Later historical research showed that at that time the name of Tesla was not
considered for the Nobel Prize, although some press did speak about it.

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 Picture 03: Monument of Nikola Tesla

8. COLORADO SPRINGS

In 1899, Tesla moves to a laboratory in Colorado Springs, USA, to begin his experiments with
high voltage and electric field measurements. Tesla's objectives in this laboratory were: to develop
a high-power transmitter, to perfect the means to individualize and isolate transmitted power, and
to determine the laws of propagation of currents over the earth and atmosphere. In Colorado
Springs Tesla wrote notes with a detailed description of his day-to-day research.

Picture 03: Laboratory of Tesla in Colorado Springs

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There he spent half of his time measuring and testing his enormous Tesla coil and also developing
small signal receivers and measuring the capacity of a vertical antenna. He also made observations
on fireballs, which he claimed to have produced. One day, Tesla noticed unusual behavior of a
storm-recording instrument, a rotating cohesive.

These were periodic recordings when a storm was approaching and away from his laboratory. He
concluded that it was the existence of standing waves, which could be created by its oscillator.
With sensitive equipment he was able to make measurements of lightning rays that fell at a great
distance from his laboratory, observing that the discharge waves grew to a peak and then decreased
before repeating the total cycle.

Tesla suggested that this was due to the fact that the earth and the atmosphere possessed electricity,
which made the planet behave like a conductor of limitless dimensions, in which it was possible
to transmit wireless telegraph messages, and still more; Transmit electrical power to any terrestrial
distance, almost without loss, through his knowledge of resonance. Tesla had discovered that it
could produce a ring around the earth like a bell, with discharges every two hours, and also that it
could make it resonate electrically.

He believed that initially the damage could not be caused by Roentgen's rays, but by the ozone
generated on contact with the skin and partly also with nitrous acid. He thought these were
longitudinal waves, like those produced by waves in plasmas.

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III. CONCLUSIONS

After exposing this small monograph on Nikola Tesla I want to conclude by saying that for me at
least it is and will be the greatest genius of all time, a scientist who was plagued with mystery,
obscurity and little renown, there are only a few statues of Tesla in the world, you could count on
the fingers of a single hand, a unit of measurement in his honor.

Tesla, for all he did, developed and discovered; I think Tesla should have more recognition for his
achievements, because there are people like Edison, who despite being his 'Nemesis' was an
invention thief, since Tesla invented the bulb, or at that time the incandescent lamp with fibers of
carbon and Edison quickly patented it to his name. Edison believed that having Tesla as an assistant
gave him the power to put the inventions of his assistants in his name. For this reason it is that
several of Tesla's inventions are not in his name, perhaps if Tesla had patented all his inventions
would have more than two thousand, but a friend of his patented only half of this number to the
name of the great inventor and genius of Nikola Tesla

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IV. LIST OF REFERENCE

Nikola Tesla,
Recuperado de: https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla

«Tesla's Biography». Jan 11, 2019.

Recuperado de: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nikola-Tesla

Tesla Experimental Station,

Recuperado de: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Experimental_Station

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