One of the most notorious inventions of World War II was the atomic bomb. In August 1945, the United States launched the first (and so far only) nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, resulting in an estimated 110,000 to 210,000 deaths.
Despite the devastating effects of bombs, there were many other non-lethal innovations in medicine and technology during the war that dramatically reshaped the world.
Some of these innovations were based on pre-war research or design, which were not initiated until the U.S. or British government funded these projects to help the Allies. Let's talk about the six major innovations that have been realized in this development boom for the benefit of mankind.
A guinea pig is being vaccinated to determine the type of pneumonia and assist in diagnosing the disease
The flu pandemics of 1918 and 1919 had a major impact on World War I, prompting the U.S. military to develop the first influenza vaccine. Scientists began isolating influenza viruses in the 1930s, and in the 1940s, the U.S. Army helped sponsor a vaccine against the flu virus.
The United States approved the first influenza vaccine for military use in 1945 and civilian use in 1946. One of the main researchers of the project was american scientist Jonas Salk, who later successfully developed a polio vaccine.
Wounded British soldiers wait for doctors to inject penicillin
Before antibiotics such as penicillin were widely used in the United States, even small incisions and scratches could lead to fatal infections. Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928, but it wasn't until World War II that the United States began mass production of penicillin.
Making penicillin for soldiers is a major priority for the U.S. Department of War, and the army even touted the effort as a "race against death" in posters. Military surgeons were amazed at how the drug reduced pain, increased chances of survival, and made it easier for nurses and doctors to take care of soldiers on the battlefield.
The United States considered the drug essential to the war, and in preparation for the D-Day landings, the United States produced 2.3 million doses of penicillin for the Allies. Fortunately, after World War II, civilians were also granted the right to use this life-saving drug.
In May 1941, jet propulsion ships took off, demonstrating for the first time that jet propulsion was a viable alternative to propellers.
Frank Whittle was an engineer in the RAF who filed his first patent for jet engines in 1930. But the first country to fly a jet-engined aircraft was Germany, which conducted a flight test of its model on August 27, 1939, a few days before the invasion of Poland.
As the war began, the British government developed aircraft based on Whittle's design. On May 15, 1941, the first Allied aircraft using jet propulsion took off, which may have gone faster than propeller aircraft, but also required more fuel and was more difficult to handle. Although there was no impact on the war at that time (it was still in the early stages of development), the advent of jet engines was destined to revolutionize the development of the military and civil aviation industries.
Doctors are caring for wounded soldiers, performing plasma transfusions.
During World War II, an American surgeon named Charles Drew standardized the production of plasma for medical purposes, and the entire system consisted of two sterile jars, one with water and one with lyophilized plasma, which only needed to be mixed together when used.
This is different from whole blood, at least the plasma that is shared can be used by anyone, regardless of the person's blood type, which makes it easier to save blood on the battlefield.
In October 1943, the world's first electronically programmable computer allowed cryptographers to decipher the top-secret military communiqué between Hitler and his army.
In the 1940s, the term "eniac" referred to people (mostly women) who performed complex calculations by hand. During World War II, the United States began to develop new machines to calculate ballistic trajectories, and those who calculated by hand were engaged in programming these machines.
The programmer who worked on the Eniac machine at the University of Pennsylvania, Jean Jennings Bartice, has been leading the development of computer storage and memory; Francis Elizabeth "Betty" Holberton, who created the first software application; Lieutenant Grace Hopper (later Admiral of the U.S. Navy) also programmed the Mark One machine at Harvard University during the war, developing the first computer programming language.
This innovation and progress, each of which has driven the vigorous development of modern society.
Personnel in charge of radar range during World War II
MIT's Radiation Laboratory, also known as the "Rad Lab," played a huge role in advancing radar technology in the 1940s, however, the lab's initial goal was to use electromagnetic radiation as a weapon, not a form of object detection.
Their first idea was that if they could fire a beam of electromagnetic energy on an airplane, they might be able to kill the pilot by extreme heat. But during the experiment, the electromagnetic energy did not play a killing role, but was bounced back. They thought that electromagnetic radiation could be used to detect the state of the object after being bounced back, just like the sonar detectors used in daily life, based on which they began to study radar and put it into military use, successfully helping the Allies detect enemy ships and aircraft.
Later, radar was also used for many non-military purposes, including guiding civilian crafts and detecting major weather events such as hurricanes, heavy rains, and land vegetation conditions.