General Electric Research Laboratory was the first industrial research facility in the United States. Established in 1900, the lab was home to the early technological breakthroughs of

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable ene ...

and created a research and development environment that set the standard for industrial innovation for years to come.General Electric. "Heritage of Research." 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20180612163649/https://www.ge.com/about-us/history/research-heritage (accessed 08 June 2019). It developed into GE Global Research that now covers an array of technological research, ranging from healthcare to transportation systems, at multiple locations throughout the world. Its campus in

Schenectady, New York Schenectady () is a city in Schenectady County, New York, United States, of which it is the county seat. As of the 2020 census, the city's population of 67,047 made it the state's ninth-largest city by population. The city is in eastern New Yo ...

was designated a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places liste ...

in 1975. and

History

Founding

Founded in 1900 by

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847October 18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventi ...

Willis R. Whitney Willis Rodney Whitney (August 22, 1868 – January 9, 1958) was an American chemist and founder of the research laboratory of the General Electric Company. He is known as the "father of industrial research" in the United States for blending the wo ...

, and Charles Steinmetz, this lab defined industrial research for years to come.

Elihu Thomson Elihu Thomson (March 29, 1853 – March 13, 1937) was an English-born American engineer and inventor who was instrumental in the founding of major electrical companies in the United States, the United Kingdom and France. Early life He was bor ...

, one of the founding members of the laboratory, summed up the goal of the lab saying, "It does seem to me therefore that a Company as large as the General Electric Company, should not fail to continue investing and developing in new fields: there should, in fact, be a research laboratory for commercial applications of new principles, and even for the discovery of those principles." Furthermore, Edwin W. Rice, founding vice president, said they wanted to "establish a laboratory to be devoted exclusively to original research. It is hoped by this means that many profitable fields may be discovered."Guy Bartlett. "The General Electric Research Laboratory. What It Is and What It Has Accomplished." Journal of Chemical Education". 6. 10 (1929), 1619. ACS Publications (accessed November 28, 2010). Whitney and the founders of the research lab took many of their lab ideals from a German university model. German universities allowed professors to research and experiment with their own interests to seek further knowledge without having commercial or economic interests in mind. Other German scientists also researched exclusively with business in mind. But, these two views contributed to a successful relationship between science and industry. It was this success that influenced Whitney in his vision for the GE Research Lab.Thomas P. Hughes. ''American Genesis''. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. The laboratory began at a time when the American electrification process was in its infant stage. General Electric became the leader of this move toward electrifying the United States and developing new technologies for many other science and technology fields. Willis Whitney and his assistant, Thomas Dempster, were the key researchers in developing the electrical technology that allowed the laboratory to continue to grow. The lab grew from 8 people to 102 people by 1906, which included scientifically trained researchers that made up 40% of the staff. Whitney believed in exploratory scientific research, with the goal of creating new commercial products. These two goals appealed to General Electric. For researchers, the lab provided time and money for experimentation, research, and personal interests without putting a high demand on developing theories or teaching. Nearly 30 years after its founding, the laboratory had expanded the staff to more than 400 chemists, physicists, and electrical engineers, plus their assistants.

Early success

It took several years for the lab to follow through with the vision to create all original innovations, instead of improving on the inventions already in place. GE's earliest project was perfecting the

incandescent light bulb An incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe is an electric light with a wire filament heated until it glows. The filament is enclosed in a glass bulb with a vacuum or inert gas to protect the filament from oxi ...

. In 1908, engineer and new head researcher William Coolidge invented the ductile tungsten light bulb filament, providing a more durable and long-lasting light filament than the existing technology. "The invention secured GE's technological leadership in the market and epitomized the role of the GE research lab — bringing innovation to the marketplace." But, that work was still an improvement on existing technology and nothing entirely new. In the coming years, GE scientists earned two Nobel Prizes in chemistry and physics. In 1932,

Irving Langmuir Irving Langmuir (; January 31, 1881 – August 16, 1957) was an American chemist, physicist, and engineer. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1932 for his work in surface chemistry. Langmuir's most famous publication is the 1919 ar ...

won the Nobel Prize in chemistry for his work on surface chemical reactions which helped him develop the gas-filled light bulb in 1916. After patenting many inventions, Langmuir developed his new light bulb which reinvented lights altogether. By 1928, due to Langmuir's innovation, GE held 96% of incandescent light sales in America. That entirely new invention set GE on a path to follow through with Whitney and Rice's vision for the lab.

Later history

Starting with the success of the incandescent and gas-filled light bulbs, General Electric expanded its research to a range of technological and scientific fields. It strove for commercial goals in any innovation they achieved. Throughout its history, the General Electric Research Laboratory has earned thousands of patents for innovative technology, redefining industries and commercial products. In 1999, the laboratory became GE Global Research after opening a research center in Bangalore, India. GE later opened research laboratories in Oklahoma, China, Germany, and Brazil, but closed all but the New York and India locations in 2017 as part of cost cutting measures. GE has expanded its research beyond lighting to appliances, aviation, electrical distribution, energy, healthcare, media & entertainment, oil & gas, transportation, and water, along with numerous other fields.General Electric, "GE Global Research." 2010. http://ge.geglobalresearch.com (accessed 23 November ). They employ 3,000 employees and continue to bring innovation and technology to the world, the same goal of General Electric that was first proposed by Whitney and Steinmetz.

Notable historic innovations

* 1900: GE Industrial Research Laboratory is established * 1902: Electric fan * 1908: Tungsten light bulb filament * 1910: First electric hotpoint range * 1916: Gas-filled light bulb * 1918: Record-capacity water wheel generator at Niagara Falls * 1918: Trans-oceanic radio system * 1920: Portable x-ray machine * 1921: GE turbosupercharger engine helps an aircraft reach a record altitude * 1921: Magnetron vacuum tube * 1927: First television brought into the home * 1941: First U.S. Jet Engine * 1943: First auto-pilot system * 1946: Cloud seeding developed * 1949: The J47 jet engine is developed, which came to be the most produced gas turbine jet engine in history * 1962: Solid-state laser * 1969: Key technologies in the first moon landing * 1976: Computed Tomography (CT) scanner * 1983: Signa Magnetic Resonance Imaging system (MRI) * 2002: Popularization of wind turbines * 2003: Fuel-efficient Evolution Series locomotive engine * 2007: First 24 cylinder internal combustion engineGeneral Electric, "GE Innovation Timeline." 2010. http://www.ge.com/innovation/timeline/index.html (accessed 23 November ).

Notable employees

* Ralph Alpher, cosmologist *

LeRoy Apker LeRoy W. Apker (June 11, 1915 – July 5, 1970) was an American experimental physicist. Along with his colleagues E. A. Taft and Jean Dickey, he studied the photoelectric emission of electrons from semiconductors and discovered the phenomenon ...

, solid-state physicist * George C. Baldwin, theoretical and experimental physicist * Frank Benford, electrical engineer and physicist best known for rediscovering and generalizing Benford's law * Charles Coffin, businessman and engineer *

William David Coolidge William David Coolidge (; October 23, 1873 – February 3, 1975) was an American physicist and engineer, who made major contributions to X-ray machines. He was the director of the General Electric Research Laboratory and a vice-president of t ...

, physicist *

, inventor, scientist and businessman *

Ivar Giaever Ivar Giaever ( no, Giæver, ; born April 5, 1929) is a Norwegian-American engineer and physicist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1973 with Leo Esaki and Brian Josephson "for their discoveries regarding tunnelling phenomena in solids". G ...

, Nobel Laureate and physicist * Robert N. Hall, physicist, inventor of the first

laser diode The laser diode chip removed and placed on the eye of a needle for scale A laser diode (LD, also injection laser diode or ILD, or diode laser) is a semiconductor device similar to a light-emitting diode in which a diode pumped directly with ...

* Nick Holonyak, physicist, inventor of the first visible light

Peter T. Kirstein Peter Thomas Kirstein (20 June 1933 – 8 January 2020) was a British computer scientist who played a role in the creation of the Internet. He put the first computer on the ARPANET outside of the US and was instrumental in defining and implem ...

, computer scientist *

, Nobel Laureate, chemist and physicist * David Musser, computer scientist *

Charles Proteus Steinmetz Charles Proteus Steinmetz (born Karl August Rudolph Steinmetz, April 9, 1865 – October 26, 1923) was a German-born American mathematician and electrical engineer and professor at Union College. He fostered the development of alternati ...

, mathematician and electrical engineer * Alexander Stepanov, computer scientist *

, engineer and inventor *

Willis Rodney Whitney Willis Rodney Whitney (August 22, 1868 – January 9, 1958) was an American chemist and founder of the research laboratory of the General Electric Company. He is known as the "father of industrial research" in the United States for blending the wo ...

, chemist

References

{{Authority control National Historic Landmarks in New York (state) General Electric Buildings and structures in Schenectady, New York Research institutes established in 1900 1900 establishments in New York (state) Thomas Edison National Register of Historic Places in Schenectady County, New York