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National Resources Planning Board 



of electric power to the purposes of transportation 

 may be ascribed to industrial laboratory research; and 

 so on through the electrical-engineering arts. 



The Consequences of the Evolution 



Industrial research and the accompanying discoveries 

 and inventions in the electrical-engineering field have 

 been constant contributors to the comfort, convenience, 

 and economy of living, and at the same time have 

 contributed to health, productivity, contentment, and 

 happiness in the Nation. 



Through such research and inventions, the standards 

 of quality and the cost of telephone apparatus and 

 plant have been so improved in two-fifths of a century 

 that telephone service has been changed from the status 

 of a frequently used business instrumentality and a 

 home luxury to the status in tliis country of a common- 

 place essential of business and of a family utility which 

 vies with the automobile in popularity. 



In the automobile itself, the same processes of organ- 

 ized research, discovery, and invention have, through 

 the electric means for starting, ignition, and lighting, 

 contributed much to the attractiveness of that vehicle 

 as an agency of transportation and recreation. 



FiGDEE 95. — Assembling of Million-Volt X-ray Unit, General 

 Electric Company, Schenectady, New York 



Electric lamps are notable examples of the results of 

 industrial research in the electrical-engineering field. 

 They are the direct ofi'spring of industrial research and 

 its associated discoveries and inventions. The econ- 

 omy of present-day artificial illumination is a monument 

 to the process. For example, during the last third of 

 a century research and invention relating to the ordinary 

 incandescent lamp have resulted in more than doubling 

 the output of light per imit of electrical energy ex- 

 pended, while the cost of lamp units for general use 

 has fallen to a fraction of the former figures, and incan- 

 descent lamps (with their safety, convenience, and 

 satisfaction for the home, office, store, and factory) 

 have in this country substantially displaced the cruder 

 and less safe illuminating agents of previous generations. 

 During the same period, the price of electric power per 

 kilowatt-hour has steadily fallen as a consequence of 

 the same influences, but not to so large a proportion. 



Such examples can be carried on to a multitude of 

 instances. Even pressure vessels like high-pressure 

 steam boilers and hydraulic penstocks are more econom- 

 ically made by using electric welding (a product of 

 research and invention) in substitution for the older 

 method of riveting. But space does not justify further 

 illustrations. Industrial research in each decade is 

 primarily concerned with the conditions of that decade, 

 as well as being earnest with anticipation and pre- 

 vision for the future. Therefore the foregoing brief 

 review of the evolution during former periods must 

 suffice for the description of past conditions. 



Analysis of Our Current Activities 



We will now turn to those present-day activities 

 which are notably characterizing industrial research in 

 the electrical-engineering field. 



Measurements 



An industry is not at full stature until it possesses 

 precision instruments for the measurements with which 

 to guide its industrial processes, nor is a nation in full 

 stature as an industrial nation until it is competent to 

 design and manufacture all precision instruments 

 needed for use in its industries, both as working tools 

 for measurements and as precise control standards. 

 The problems of standards of manufacture and precise 

 standards in methods, and in instruments for measure- 

 ments, have proved worthy of extended research. 

 Electrical engineering has been fortunate, since (spring- 

 ing as it did from strictly scientific grounds) logical 

 units were early derived and methods of measurements 

 were set up. An early committee of the British Asso- 

 ciation for the Advancement of Science was a pioneer 

 in this respect. At the present day, levels of precision 

 in electrical measurement challenge the precision of 



