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Learn About Famous Inventors Who Have Changed the World

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Browse List of Inductees
Showing 1 - 25 of 80 results
Elias Howe headshot

Elias Howe

Sewing Machine

Elias Howe invented the first practical sewing machine. Born in Spencer, Massachusetts, he spent his childhood and early adult years in Massachusetts…
Inducted in: 2004
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 4,750
Died:
Military Service: U.S. Army

Gideon Sundback

Modern Zipper

Swedish-born engineer Gideon Sundback improved on Whitcomb Judson's work, making the zipper practical and commercially successful. Today, thousands…
Inducted in: 2006
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 1,219,881
Died:

Henry Ford

Transmission Mechanism

Pioneering automotive engineer Henry Ford held many patents on automotive mechanisms. He is best remembered, however, for helping devise the factory…
Inducted in: 1982
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 1,005,186
Died:
Rebecca Richards-Kortum

Rebecca Richards-Kortum

Medical Devices for Low-Resource Settings

Rebecca Richards-Kortum develops low-cost, high-performance medical technologies for poor communities where standard medical equipment isn't an…
Inducted in: 2019
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 7,365,844
Radia Perlman

Radia Perlman

Robust Network Routing and Bridging

Radia Perlman has played a major role in driving the growth and development of the internet. Her best-known contribution is the Spanning Tree…
Inducted in: 2016
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: 5,086,428, 7,339,900
Lloyd Augustus Hall

Lloyd Augustus Hall

Food Preservatives

Lloyd Hall was a pioneer in the field of food chemistry, creating many of the preservative chemicals that are now used to keep food fresh without…
Inducted in: 2004
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 2,107,697
Died:
Emmanuelle Charpentier

Emmanuelle Charpentier

CRISPR-Cas9 Gene Editing

Microbiologist Emmanuelle Charpentier and biochemist Jennifer Doudna co-invented the gene-editing system CRISPR-Cas9, a versatile technology for…
Inducted in: 2023
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 10,266,850
Ming-Jun Li

Ming-Jun Li

Bend-Insensitive Optical Fiber

Ming-Jun Li, Dana Bookbinder and Pushkar Tandon invented bend-insensitive optical fiber. This technology can bend without causing significant signal…
Inducted in: 2022
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: 7,450,806, 7,903,917, 8,385,701
Mary-Dell Chilton

Mary-Dell Chilton

Transgenic Plant

Mary-Dell Chilton is one of the founders of modern plant biotechnology. She led the research team that produced the first transgenic, or genetically…
Inducted in: 2015
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 6,051,757
Philippe Horvath

Philippe Horvath

CRISPR-Enhanced Food Products

Molecular biologists Philippe Horvath and Rodolphe Barrangou discovered that CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) and…
Inducted in: 2023
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: 9,879,269, 9,951,342
Jan Ernst Matzeliger

Jan Ernst Matzeliger

Shoe-Lasting Machine

Jan Matzeliger invented the automatic shoe-lasting machine, mechanizing the complex process of joining a shoe sole to its upper, and revolutionizing…
Inducted in: 2006
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 274,207
Died:
Barney Graham

Barney Graham

Structure-Based Vaccine Design

Immunologist and virologist Barney Graham and structural biologist Jason McLellan used structure-based vaccine design to stabilize and modify surface…
Inducted in: 2025
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: 9,738,689, 10,960,070
Virginia Norwood

Virginia Norwood

Multispectral Scanner

Virginia Norwood invented the Multispectral Scanner (MSS), the first in a series of satellite-based instruments that have been continuously imaging…
Inducted in: 2025
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 2,746,035
Died:
Margaret Knight

Margaret E. Knight

Machine for Making Flat-Bottom Paper Bags

Margaret Knight invented a machine that could automatically cut, fold and glue flat-bottomed paper bags. Her revolutionary invention enabled the mass…
Inducted in: 2006
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: RE 9202
Died:
Norbert Rillieux

Norbert Rillieux

Automated Sugar Refining

Considered one of the earliest chemical engineers, Norbert Rillieux revolutionized the sugar industry when he invented a refining process,…
Inducted in: 2004
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 4,879
Died:
Joseph Lechleider headshot

Joseph Lechleider

DSL - Digital Subscriber Line

Although inventors such as Alexander Graham Bell and Samuel Morse had speculated that data other than voice information could be transmitted over…
Inducted in: 2013
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 5,181,198
Died:

Herbert M. Strong

Diamond Synthesis

Herbert Strong, along with Tracy Hall, Francis Bundy, and Robert Wentorf, synthesized diamonds as part of Project Superpressure, as announced by the…
Inducted in: 2010
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 2,947,610
Died:

Eli Terry

Clock

A native of East Windsor, Connecticut, Eli Terry had his start in the clock-making business in a series of apprenticeships where he manufactured both…
Inducted in: 2007
Born:
Died:
Mary Florence Potts

Mary Florence Potts

Cold-Handle Sad Iron

Mary Florence Potts invented an improved sad iron, which was lighter and offered a cooler, more ergonomic handle. Beginning in the 1870s, it was…
Inducted in: 2024
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: 103,501, 113,448
Died:
John Ericsson headshot

John Ericsson

Screw Propeller

John Ericsson invented the ship propeller and incorporated the landmark device into his design for the Civil War ironclad the Monitor. Born in the…
Inducted in: 1993
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 588
Died:
Donald B. Keck headshot

Donald B. Keck

Optical Fiber

Donald B. Keck worked with Robert Maurer and Peter Schultz at Corning Laboratories to create the first successful optical fiber in 1970. In the 1880s…
Inducted in: 1993
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: 3,659,915, 3,711,262

Charles Jenkins

Motion Picture Projector

Charles Jenkins was an innovator of early cinema and one of the first inventors of television, though he used mechanical rather than electronic…
Inducted in: 2011
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 671,111
Died:

Nils I. Bohlin

Safety Belt

Nils Bohlin, while with Volvo, invented the three-point safety belt, a standard in the modern automobile. Early tests showed that the belt was…
Inducted in: 2002
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 3,043,625
Died:

Ambrose Swasey

Telescope
Ambrose Swasey, inventor of precise astronomical instruments, designed some of the most powerful and accurate telescopes of his day.Swasey was born…
Inducted in: 2006
Born:
U.S. Patent No.: 959,179
Died:

Andrew J. Moyer

Method for Production of Penicillin

Andrew J. Moyer's discoveries provided the foundation for the industrial production of penicillin. Born in Star City, Indiana, Moyer received his A.B…
Inducted in: 1987
Born:
U.S. Patent Nos.: 2,442,141, 2,443,989
Died:
Military Service: U.S. Army