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The legacy of Nikola Tesla

The AC system that he helped to usher in

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Abstract

Alternating Current (AC) is used all over the world today. In India we use AC at 50 Hz (cycles per second) and in USA and Canada at 60 Hz. During the latter part of the 19th century, even during the early part of the 20th century, Direct Current or DC was widely used. Had we continued with DC, electricity would not have been as widely available as it is today and its use would have been cumbersome, costly and severely restricted. We owe it mainly to the Serbian genius Nikola Tesla that electricity has reached almost every nook and corner of most continents.

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Suggested Reading

  1. D P Sen Gupta, Electricity — Its Generation, Transmission and Distribution, Resonance, Vol.2, No.9, pp.38–47, 1997.

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  2. D P Sen Gupta, Electricity — AC vs DC, Resonance, Vol.2, No.10, pp.46–53, 1997.

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  3. Jill Jonnes, Empires of Light, Random House Trade Paperbacks, New York, 2004.

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  4. John J. O’Neill, Prodigal Genius: The Life of Nikola Tesla, ANGRIFF publications, 1978.

  5. Anil K Rajvanshi, Nikola Tesla — the Creator of the Electric Age, Resonance, Vol.12, No.3, pp.4–12, 2007.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, 560 012, India

    D P Sen Gupta

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  1. D P Sen Gupta
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Correspondence to D P Sen Gupta.

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D P Sen Gupta graduated in Physics from Presidency College, Calcutta and later in Electrical engineering from IIT, Kharagpur. He obtained his PhD from the University of Liverpool and taught there for five years before joining IISc, Bangalore. After retirement he continued in IISc as an Emeritus Fellow and is presently an Honorary Professor at NIAS, Bangalore. The major areas of his research were dynamics of power systems and problems of rural power situation in India. Writing books of science for children is his major preoccupation now.

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Sen Gupta, D.P. The legacy of Nikola Tesla. Reson 12, 54–69 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12045-007-0020-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12045-007-0020-7

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