From the Stone Age to today, the search is constantly underway for better, more efficient ways to cook food. Reflecting many of the advances in science and technology, the electric range has become a popular choice for homes and businesses.

Although he didn't start studying physics until he retired from the clock-making business at age 30, French native Jean Peltier made immense contributions to science that still reverberate today. Even with the primitive tools available...

[Free Registration/Login may be required to access all resource tools.] A brief overview of the methods scientists use to study the ocean seafloor and the features that can be found there. Discusses the magnetic polarity of the seafloor...

Fear not, right-brained friends: Science and art intersect in plenty of places, and this is one of them. Samuel Taylor Coleridge lends a hand as we explore cryogenics - how to get things fantastically frigid - and the fascinating element...

The main figure behind the first transatlantic telegraph knew very little about the science or engineering behind it, but was convinced that with it a fortune could be made. Read about these findings here.

Organic superconductors, though still new to science, are lighter and more potentially versatile than inorganic superconductors and may have important applications in the future.

See drawing from Hans Christian Orsted's lab notebook showing an experiment in which an electric charge passing through a wire seemed to create a magnetic field!

[Free Registration/Login may be required to access all resource tools.] Discusses how mixtures of solids can be separated based on observable properties of their parts such as particle size, shape, color, and magnetic attraction.

[Free Registration/Login may be required to access all resource tools.] Discover how scientists learn about Earth's interior using seismic waves, meteorites, density, and the magnetic field. Additional resources are available for download.

This Science, Optics, and You site offers a biography of Roger Bacon with focus on his treatises on optics.

This is a sample lesson on electromagnetism. It includes animated diagrams, interactive exercises, an audio option for reading the text, and comprehension questions throughout where students can type their answers or pick from...

Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison duke it out over the best way to transmit electricity and Heinrich Hertz is the first person (unbeknownst to him) to broadcast and receive radio waves.

Hans Christian Orsted's accidental discovery that an electrical current moves a compass needle rocks the scientific world; a spate of experiments follows, immediately leading to the first electromagnet and electric motor.

New tools such as special microscopes and the cyclotron take research to higher levels, while average citizens enjoy novel amenities such as the FM radio.

Scientists' understanding of the structure of the atom and of its component particles grows, the phone and radio become common, and the modern television is born.

Albert Einstein publishes his special theory of relativity and his theory on the quantum nature of light, which he identified as both a particle and a wave. With ever new appliances, electricity begins to transform everyday life.

Scientists discover and probe x-rays and radioactivity, while inventors compete to build the first radio.

If TV medical dramas have taught us anything, it's how to recognize the heart's characteristic peaks and valleys crawling across monitors in emergency rooms. These images represent the electrical activity of the beating heart as recorded...

Gerd Binnig co-developed the scanning tunneling microscope (STM) with Heinrich Rohrer. The STM allowed scientists entry into the atomic world in a new way and was a major advance in the field of nanotechnology. For their achievement,...

The discovery of radio waves, which was widely seen as confirmation of James Clerk Maxwell's electromagnetic theory and paved the way for numerous advances in communication technology, was made by German physicist Heinrich Hertz. In the...

On line course on Electricity and Magnetism for graduate credit or professional development, that emphasizes hands on activities you can use in your classroom.

Did you know that a piece of iron can lose its magnetism if heated too high? There is a point called the Curie point when iron is heated to a high enough temperature that its iron atoms are scrambled and can't line up to form a magnetic...

Scientists use image furnaces to grow crystals at very high temperatures. A built-in camera allows them to observe in action a delicate process that is equal parts art and science.

"A magnet exerts a force on current-carrying wire." This simple device shows how magnets affect wires with current in them, the basis of the electric motor. If you see, feel and understand this, the electric motor becomes very clear.