Pupin, Mihajlo

Mihajlo Pupin, in full Mihajlo Idvorski Pupin, Anglicized as Michael Idvorsky Pupin, (born October 9 [September 27, Old Style], 1854? [see Researcher’s Note], Idvor, Military Frontier of Austria [now in Serbia]—died March 12, 1935, New York, New York, U.S.), Serbian American physicist who devised a means of greatly extending the range of long-distance telephone communication by placing loading coils (of wire) at predetermined intervals along the transmitting wire.

Pupin’s family was of Serbian origin, and his parents, who were illiterate, encouraged his education. He immigrated to the United States in 1874 and held a series of odd jobs before attending Columbia College (now Columbia University), where he earned a B.A. in 1883; that year he also became a U.S. citizen. Pupin subsequently studied at the University of Cambridge and the University of Berlin (Ph.D., 1889). In 1889 he began teaching mathematical physics at Columbia, becoming professor emeritus in 1931.

In 1896 Pupin discovered that atoms struck by X-rays emit secondary X-ray radiation. He also invented a means for taking short-exposure X-ray photographs. In 1901 American Telephone and Telegraph Co. and some German telephone interests acquired the patent for his invention of long-distance telephony. Pupin received the 1924 Pulitzer Prize in biography for his autobiographical work From Immigrant to Inventor (1923).