Nikola Tesla was a Serbian-American inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, and futurist whose work helped establish the modern alternating-current electrical system. Born in 1856 in Smiljan, then part of the Austrian Empire, he studied engineering in Europe before emigrating to the United States in 1884. His development of the polyphase alternating-current system, induction motor, transformers, and related technologies proved essential to the large-scale generation and distribution of electrical power.Tesla also conducted pioneering experiments in high-frequency electricity, wireless communication, radio control, fluorescent illumination, X-rays, mechanical resonance, and the wireless transmission of energy. A gifted lecturer and prolific inventor, he combined practical engineering skill with an expansive vision of technology's possibilities. Although many of his most ambitious projects were never completed, his discoveries and ideas continue to influence electrical engineering, communications, automation, scientific research, and popular culture.
