Internet and nuclear power plants: 6 inventions that appeared in the USSR earlier than others

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The twentieth century was an era of continuous discoveries in the field of science and technology. However, this pace often becomes a problem for those who study the history of progress. The thing is that a lot of inventions could appear in two, and even in three countries practically simultaneously and independently of each other. This means that the palm is just by chance in the wrong hands. And yet, we know for certain about some of the things that were absolutely the first to be invented by Soviet specialists.

1. The progenitor of the mobile phone

As you know, mobile phones in the form that are familiar to us were presented by the American company Motorola in 1973. However, 16 years earlier, a telephone device had already appeared in the Soviet Union, which fit in the hand and did not require wires.

We are talking about the famous device of engineer Kupriyanovich - "radiotelephone", which, however, could communicate only with one permanent base, and not with different towers, which is the main advantage of cellular communication. Therefore, it is difficult to call it a mobile phone, but it was one of the first steps on the way to them, and it was made in the USSR.

2. Nuclear power plant

Legends can be made about how intense the nuclear race between the USSR and the Western countries was. And after all, both sides were extremely strong and progressive in their quest to rein in the atom. But, nevertheless, in the matter of launching the world's first nuclear power plant, the Soviet Union turned out to be more agile.

This, without undue modesty, a breakthrough on a global scale, was made in the city of Obninsk in June 1954, as stated by the inscription above the station entrance and the corresponding memorial plaque. The West caught up with the USSR in this matter only two years later, when the UK launched its nuclear power plant. America was able to boast of its own station a year later, in 1957.

3. Internet

Of course, today everyone knows that the Internet was invented in the United States as a military development. And now it is an indisputable fact. However, the very idea of creating a unified information network was first announced by Soviet specialists.

The first of them was a military scientist, Colonel Anatoly Kitov, who in 1959 sent a note to the government, where he explained in detail the advantages of centralizing the information space, because he rightly believed that computers were the future. Following him, the famous Soviet cyberneticist Viktor Glushkov came to the same conclusions. However, neither the party nor Khrushchev personally liked these ideas. And in vain: 10 years later, in 1969, the Americans invented the same "Arpanet", which became the progenitor of the modern Internet.

4. Passenger supersonic aircraft

Conquering sound in the middle of the 20th century was as much a fix idea as the nuclear race. Therefore, it is not surprising that here, too, the USSR went with the Western countries, as they say, "toe-to-toe." However, the British - the main rivals of Soviet aviation - nevertheless conceded to the latter on the issue of creating the first supersonic passenger aircraft.

The gap was only two months: the Soviet Tu-144 made its first flight exactly for the holiday - December 31, 1968. The British "Concorde" first took to the air on March 2, 1969. And although the latter stayed in the air much longer - the commercial flights of the Concorde amounted to 243,000 hours versus 4300 for the Tu-144, the Soviet airliner nevertheless inscribed itself in history as a “firstborn”.

5. Tetris

It would seem that we should already know everything about the favorite toy of children of the 1990s - Tetris. However, not everyone knows that its inventor was not Japanese specialists, who own at least half of the ideas regarding such games, but the Soviet programmer Alexei Pajitnov.

It was he who, back in 1984, wrote the legendary geometric puzzle. Moreover, at that time he was still working at home - in the Computing Center of the USSR Academy of Sciences.

Interesting fact:but another cult game - "The Wolf Catches Eggs" - was not a unique Soviet development. Its idea was just borrowed from the Japanese.

6. Artificial heart

The artificial heart technology is, without exaggeration, revolutionary in the history of cardiology. But few people know that it was Soviet scientists who were the authors of this breakthrough.

This happened back in 1937. Then the Soviet scientist Vladimir Demikhov implanted a plastic pump with an electric motor in the dog, which worked for two hours. Amazingly, the device, which became the first artificial heart in history, was designed by the future doctor of biological sciences as a third-year student, and at the age of 30 he performed a successful operation to transplant a second heart into a dog.