It would be rash to attribute the birth of electronics to any particular device, but there is no doubt that Fleming's diode ushered in the thermionic valve era and, as distinct from earlier scientific work on electrical discharges through gases and vacua, was invented for a practical purpose in communications technology. The front cover of the November 1979 edition of Wireless World is a reference to the fact that in that year is the 75th anniversary of the invention of the thermionic diode, for it was on November 16, 1904, that Fleming filed his patent for 'a two-electrode valve for the rectification of high-frequency alternating currents'.
The Origin of the Valve John Ambrose Fleming Obituary John Ambrose Fleming (1849-1945)Ī replica of an early experimental Fleming Diode.
