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Episode 100: The optical oscilloscope

Friday, June 30th, 2023

The optical oscilloscope is one of the most visited instruments in the Faraday Museum (Técnico – Alameda campus). Manufactured in 1925 by Siemens, it shows visitors how the image of a beam of light appears and how it is possible to observe fast signals synchronised with the electrical network. This technology was at the origin of the technology that, more than 100 years ago, gave medicine the possibility of recording the movements of the heart in two dimensions on a sheet of paper – the appearance of the electrocardiographs – and may play an important role in the field of harnessing solar energy.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Albano Inácio dos Santos
    Carlos Ferreira Fernandes
    Museu Faraday

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 99: The “Diferencial” newspaper

Friday, June 23rd, 2023

Técnico’s student newspaper “Diferencial” has been in circulation since 1987. It has changed over the years, keeping the focus on giving voice to “the most important issues in higher education, in the country and in the world”. Much more than words and texts, this newspaper published by the Técnico Students’ Union (AEIST) promotes debates, organises poetry competitions and cinema sessions, disseminates cultural events, podcasts and thematic playlists… in order to “foster critical thinking in students”.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Gerardo Lisboa
    João Carranca
    Diferencial

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 98: The heat exchanger

Friday, June 16th, 2023

It weighs about two tons and measures two metres by one, and a half metres in diameter. The imposing nature of Técnico’s heat exchanger does not go unnoticed in the main atrium of the South Tower, at Alameda campus. It is, in fact, half of a heat exchanger, which was cut in half and is exhibited for teaching purposes, displaying its 224 tubes and a floating head. Despite its invention almost a century ago, it is still today a fundamental instrument in the history and practice of industrial chemistry.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Sebastião Alves

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 97: Faraday’s rotating experiment

Friday, June 9th, 2023

It’s probably older than Técnico. This electromagnet was created at the beginning of the 20th century and reproduces an experiment discovered in a London laboratory at the end of the previous century. It was the first demonstration of the interaction of a magnetic field with light, known as rotation or the Faraday effect. Almost a century later, it would have unforeseeable consequences in the field of microwaves and would allow millions of people to listen to music or watch movies with CD and DVD players. The experiment that paved the way for all this can still be replicated today at the Faraday Museum, at Técnico – Alameda campus.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Carlos Ferreira Fernandes
    Moisés Piedade
    Museu Faraday

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 96: Técnico’s First Model Aircraft

Friday, June 2nd, 2023

Técnico’s first model aircraft was built by Técnico students to compete in the second edition of the Air Cargo Challenge, in 2005. This competition, which was also created in 2003 by Técnico students, has a major dimension today. The mission of building model aircraft to fly with maximum load would give a boost to the Aerospace Engineering Students’ Organisation (AeroTéc). So as not to forget that achievement, the students’ organisation still keeps the first model aircraft, in the basement of the Mechanics Building (III), at Alameda campus. The work developed by AeroTéc has allowed the team to build rockets, turbines and even other model aircraft capable of detecting fires.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Afonso Vale
    Duarte Albuquerque
    João Pedro Loureiro

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 95: Faraday’s balance

Friday, May 26th, 2023

It is the first equipment for the study of magnetism acquired for research in Portugal and occupies a prominent place in the history of magnetic characterisation of materials. The balance arrived in 1987 at the present Tecnológico e Nuclear Campus (CTN) of Instituto Superior Técnico, located in Loures (former INETI and ITN), and accompanied the beginning of a group dedicated to the study of materials. This work of characterising superconducting materials played a fundamental role in the technological evolution of areas such as the electric motors currently used in vehicles, which are increasingly smaller and more reliable.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Carlos Ferreira Fernandes
    Moisés Piedade
    Museu Faraday

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 94: The Herrmann telegraph

Friday, May 12th, 2023

The Herrmann telegraph was made almost entirely in Portugal, at the end of the 19th century, and made a decisive contribution to real-time communication in the country. The device printed Morse codes on a very narrow paper tape, without requiring the presence of people decoding messages on site. It would be installed in post offices all over the country, after its creation by Maximiliano Augusto Herrmann. One of these telegraphs is exhibited in the Faraday Museum, at Técnico – Alameda campus. It is in full operation, showing visitors the mechanisms that brought people closer together when long-distance communication in real time was still almost a mirage.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Albano Inácio dos Santos
    Moisés Piedade

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 93: The woodcuts

Friday, May 5th, 2023

There are eight woodcuts by the architect Miguel Ventura Terra, published in 1916, showing the school’s facilities on a plot of land next to the current Portuguese Parliament, in Lisbon. Due to a series of events, the work commissioned by Alfredo Bensaúde, Técnico’s first director, never happened. More than a decade later, Técnico saw its building rise in Alameda, in a project designed by Porfírio Pardal Monteiro.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Ana Tostões
    Ana Isabel Ribeiro
    Hélia Silva

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 92: The photo enlarger

Friday, April 28th, 2023

The photo enlarger of  Núcleo de Arte Fotográfica do Técnico (NAF) helps us to see in greater detail more than 70 years of the history of NAF, founded in the 50s. Known for its laboratory open to the community and its photography courses, the group experienced one of its most memorable moments in 1993, during the violent police attacks on a group of students near the Portuguese Parliament, in Lisbon. The images were captured by the lenses of several Técnico students who managed to revive the student struggle and “show that something was wrong” when violence was used to silence a group of students.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Carlos Miguel Fernandes
    Emanuel Moreira
    Núcleo de Arte Fotográfica do Técnico (NAF)

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

Episode 91: Técnico’s microwave educational kit

Friday, April 21st, 2023

Técnico’s microwave educational kit is an example of the importance of experimentation in teaching and research. Designed in the 1960s and currently on display at the Faraday Museum, Alameda campus, it played a key role in the field of Electrical Engineering. The kit, which is impeccably preserved in a green box, was designed to disseminate microwave techniques. The kit included everything it was needed to carry out fundamental experiments such as transmission, antennas, microwave receivers, accumulator devices, resonant cavities and emitted signal frequency, among others.

  • Acknowledgements:
    Moisés Piedade
    Rui Louro
    Museu Faraday

Episode only available in Portuguese in: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Anchor.fm

Further reading and additional audio in the Portuguese version of this webpage.

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