The German physicist Ferdinand Braun (1850-1918) received the Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on wireless telegraphy.

Karl Ferdinand Braun was born in Fulda, Germany, on June 6, 1850, the son of Konrad and Franziska (Gohring) Braun. Upon graduation from his local gymnasium, he entered the University of Marburg, later completing his Ph.D. at the University of Berlin in 1872 with a dissertation on the vibrations of elastic rods and strings.

Braun's career began at the University of Würzburg in 1872, where he worked as assistant to George Hermann Quincke, the eminent German physicist and authority on elastic vibrations--of which light (electromagnetic radiation) was thought to be a species. Braun remained with Quincke two years, publishing in 1874 the results of his research on mineral metal sulfides. He discovered that these crystals would conduct electrical currents in one direction only. This finding was important in electrical research and in...