Poulsenn.
/ˈpəʊlsən/, U.S. /ˈpoʊlsən/ Now historical.
1. attributive. Used with reference to electrical devices invented by Poulsen, esp. his system for generating continuous radio waves using an arc discharge (see sense 2).
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1901 Anaconda (Montana) Standard 13 Aug. 5/4 It is stated that the reproduction in sensitiveness and clearness is superior to that rendered by the Poulsen telegraphone.
1906 Oakland (Calif.) Tribune 16 Dec. 22/2 While the spark form of electricity which the Poulsen system will supercede may be likened to a series of explosions the new current is like a continuously vibrating tuning fork.
1913 Gleaner (Kingston, Jamaica) 12 May 3/5 I have already visited the Poulsen station at Whitley Bay, Northumberland.
1918 Proc. Royal Soc. 1917–18 A. 94 p. xxxiv The arc is made to sing a note so high that it cannot be heard, but not high enough to be seen. The Poulsen generator is a development of this principle.
1922 D. S. Jordan Days of Man II. xxxiv. 244 During the war he was engaged in building Poulsen wireless stations for the governments of Great Britain and France.
1944 M. Ward G. K. Chesterton 290 It emerged that the Poulsen System had offered to erect stations at a cost of about £36,000 less per station than the Marconi.
2. Poulsen arc n. an arc discharge produced between a carbon electrode and a water-cooled copper electrode in an atmosphere of hydrogen or hydrocarbon vapour and a strong magnetic field, formerly used to generate continuous high-frequency radio waves for radio-telegraphy.
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the world > matter > physics > electromagnetic radiation > electronics > electronic phenomena > [noun] > waveform > arc discharge producing short waves
Poulsen arc1906
1906 Electrician 21 Dec. 375/1 The physical..circumstances of the Poulsen arc are rather forbidding.
1916 Electrician 14 Jan. 535/2 In wireless telegraphy there has been a notable advance in the use of the Poulsen arc.
1931 L. B. Turner Wireless v. 131 To start a Poulsen arc it must be struck... In keying, therefore, the oscillation cannot be started and stopped as in a spark transmitter. Instead, the Morse key—or..the set of relay contacts controlled by the key—is made to alter the wavelength slightly.
1949 W. R. Maclaurin Invention & Innovation in Radio Industry iv. 60 The patents on the Poulsen arc were held by enterprises that were competing with Marconi.
2001 S. Hong Wireless vi. 165 The purpose of the Poulsen arc (which was the culmination of several years of research by Poulsen and P. O. Pedersen) was to increase the maximum frequency of Duddell's singing arc.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2006; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1901