1. Inventions of XX-XXI century
Great Britain produced many of the most influential scientists,
mathematicians and inventors in modern history. With influential people, come
influential ideas, theories and inventions, some of which have the potential to
change the world forever. During XX-XXI century in the UK were devised a lot of
inventions. Their enumeration would take much time so today I would like
mention the most significant and the most interesting.
XX CENTURY
The first of the inventions that I would like to is the creation of nuclear physic by
Ernest Rutherford. When he was studying at Manchester University, Rutherford
discovers that the atom is a small, heavy nucleus surrounded by orbital electrons.
In 1901 Hubert Booth patents the first vacuum cleaner. His large machine is first
used in stores.
1906-1930 FREDERICK HOPKINS DISCOVERS VITAMINS
As a young man Frederick Hopkins works for six months as an insurance clerk
before he takes a course in chemistry, sits an examination, and does so well that
Thomas Stevenson, an expert in poisoning, engages him as his assistant. Hopkins
contributes to several important legal cases, takes his London University degree in
the shortest possible time, and then studies medicine at Guy's Hospital, London.
Biochemistry is a new, underfunded field, but Hopkins pursues his research. In
1929 Hopkins shares the Nobel Prize with Christiaan Eijkman for discovering
substances vital to life and maintaining health – vitamins.
1914 BRITS INVENT AIRCRAFT CARRIERS
Many people consider military inventions curse, and hardly the best work
produced by anybody. However, without them civilized people would die at the
hands of barbarians.
In 1914, the Brits launch HMS Ark Royal, the world's first aircraft carrier. The
Americans launch their first carrier in 1920. At the beginning of World War II,
1924 -1928 JOHN LOGIE BAIRD BECOMES FIRST TO TELEVISE PICTURES
He is plagued by ill health, but John Logie Baird decides to create a television, a
dream of many scientists. Within two years Baird has built his first crude set.
Two years later Baird demonstrates the world's first television to fifty scientists in
his attic workshop. The next year, 1927, he demonstrates television over 438

2. miles of telephone line between London and Glasgow, and in 1928 he achieves
the first transatlantic television transmission between London and New York.
The BBC begins using Baird's television in 1929, but Baird's television works
mechanically. He is exploring electronically supported television when he is edged
out by Marconi.
In 1930 Baird demonstrates big-screen television in the London Coliseum,
televises the first live TV transmission (of a horse race), develops colour
television, and is the first to demonstrate ultra-short wave transmission.
1949 ZEBRA CROSSINGS FOR PEDESTRIANS
Zebra crossings are one of those inventions that has been adopted around the
world. The first zebra pedestrian crossings are traced back to the Belisha beacons
named after the Minister of Transport, Leslie Hore-Belisha, who introduced them
in 1934.
Pedestrians have right of way in the zebra crossing once they have put a foot on
it. However, they do depend on motorists stopping and giving way.
1960s PETER SCOTT PUTS CONSERVATION ON MAP, FOUNDS WWF, WORLD WILDLIFE FUND (NOW
KNOWN AS WORLDWIDE FUND FOR NATURE)
Peter Scott, Julian Huxley, Max Nicholson, and several others found WWF to help
save wildlife and habitats. His father, Robert Falcon Scott, would have been
pleased. As he lay dying in Antarctica, he hoped his young son would be
interested in natural history.
Peter Scott is particularly interested in wildfowl. He paints them, writes about
them, and establishes trusts to preserve their habitat. The first man knighted for
his contributions to protecting nature, he originates the Red Data Books, which
identify endangered species, and are an essential tool for conservationists.
Today WWF is an international organisation with hundreds of thousands of
members. It sponsors projects around the world to conserve beach, forest, and
wetlands and to create living relationships for the people and the animals who
share these lands. WWF was led for years by Sir Peter and later by HRH Prince
Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.
1989 TIM BERNERS-LEE INVENTS THE LIBERATING, CIVILISATION-ALTERING WORLD WIDE WEB
In the 1960s, the United States “saw universal networking as a potential unifying
human revolution” and implemented a “highly robust and survivable” physical
network based on packet switching. The Internet was born as an open and
organic enterprise that established interconnection and routing policies, and
welcomed expanding networks of users. It required just one other thing for

3. worldwide use: a way for all its users to communicate – www or the World Wide
Web.
The son of parents who met while working on computers, Tim Berners-Lee grows
up playing unconventional games at the dinner table. At Oxford, he builds his own
working electronic computer out of spare parts and a TV set.
He hits on the idea of linking files on his computer, and writes a computer
program he calls Enquire.
But that is only the beginning. Working alone, Tim Berners-Lee takes the concept
of freely accessing knowledge and communicating around the world as far as they
have ever been taken. He decides to open up his computer to everyone, and
invite them to link their material. In his vision there is no central manager, no
central database, and no scaling problems. The world wide Web is open-ended
and infinite. But for this to occur it has to have a language.
So Tim weaves together a relatively easy-to-learn coding system — HTML
(HyperText Mark-up Language). He designs an addressing scheme that gives each
Web page a unique location or url (universal resource locator), and he hacks a set
of rules called HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) that allow these documents to
be linked together on computers across the Internet. In less than a decade his
program will create a global mass medium.
XXI CENTURY
2000 - 2012 BRIT JONATHAN IVE DESIGNS FOR APPLE - iMacs, iPods, iPhones, iPads
2005 MANCHESTER SCIENTISTS DISCOVER UNKNOWN MATTER
A team of British and Russian scientists at the University of Manchester discover a
new class of previously unknown materials which are one atom thick and exhibit
properties never seen before.
The new materials are ultra-thin, but can be ultra-strong, highly-insulating or
highly-conductive. The discovery opens up fascinating possibilities – clothing that
insulates but is lighter than gossamer; extremely light and strong computers
made from materials with only one atom.
2005 YORKSHIRE CANCER RESEARCH MOVES TOWARD PROSTATE CANCER CURE
Working at the Yorkshire Cancer Research Unit (YCR) at the University of York,
Norman Maitland and Anne Collins extract and grow prostate tumour stem cells.
This is an exciting development in creating a therapy for eliminating cancer cells.
Existing treatments typically reduce the number of cancer cells, but do not
eradicate them. Now that tumour stem cells have been grown, specific therapies
for killing them can be developed.

4. 2006 BRITS USE JUICE FROM MAGGOTS TO SPEED HEALING OF WOUNDS
Maggots have been deliberately applied to wounds to get rid of dead tissue and
kill bacteria by eating it. Now, according to The Telegraph, "Scientists from
Bradford University have discovered an extra benefit: the secretions produced by
the maggots actually speed up the body's healing process." They expect that
within three years they will have bandages infused with maggot juice to speed the
regeneration of injured flesh.
2006 BRITISH AND AMERICAN RESEARCHERS RESTORE SIGHT TO BLIND USING CELL TRANSPLANTS
British and American researchers are using cell transplants to restore sight to
blind mice, and hope “it may be possible for doctors to treat conditions that cause
irreversible blindness, such as age-related macular degeneration and diabetic eye
damage” for hundreds of thousands who have lost their sight.
The plan is to use stem cell-like retinal cells from the affected patient. The
research was published in the magazine Nature.
2007 BRITISH RESEARCH TEAM GROWS HEART VALVE FROM STEM CELLS
A British research team led by Sir Magdi Yacoub, a professor of cardiac surgery at
Imperial College London and one of the world's leading heart surgeons, has grown
part of a human heart from stem cells for the first time. If trials scheduled for
later this year prove successful, replacement tissue could be used in transplants
for hundreds of thousands of people suffering from heart disease within three
years. Since the stem cells are not embryonic, and can be supplied by the person
who needs the heart, no immune-rejection problems occur.
All these staff made our life easier and saved a lot of lives. Thank to British
inventors we have such a thing as VITAMINS, PENICILLIN, THE JET PLANE, WORLD
WIDE WEB, RADIO TELESCOPES, BIRTH CONTROL PILL and many other useful
things.