Benno Mengele (11 December 1898 in

Zwettl Zwettl (; Central Bavarian: ''Zwedl''; Czech: ''Světlá'') is a town and district capital of the Austrian state of Lower Austria. It is chiefly known as the location of Zwettl Abbey, first mentioned in October 1139. History The name origina ...

, Lower Austria – 15 September 1971 in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

) was an Austrian

electrical engineer Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems that use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

. Mengele studied from 1918 to 1923 at the

Vienna University of Technology TU Wien () is a public research university in Vienna, Austria. The university's teaching and research are focused on engineering, computer science, and natural sciences. It currently has about 28,100 students (29% women), eight faculties, and ...

and worked from 1922 at the Austrian

Siemens-Schuckert Siemens-Schuckert (or Siemens-Schuckertwerke) was a German electrical engineering company headquartered in Berlin, Erlangen and Nuremberg that was incorporated into the Siemens AG in 1966. Siemens Schuckert was founded in 1903 when Siemens & H ...

. He developed protective earthing and

fault current In an electric power system, a fault is a defect that results in abnormality of electric current. A fault current is any abnormal electric current. For example, a short circuit in which a live wire touches a neutral or ground wire is a fault. An op ...

, and in 1929, he and Gustav Markt developed the

overhead power line An overhead power line is a structure used in electric power transmission and distribution to transmit electrical energy along large distances. It consists of one or more conductors (commonly multiples of three) suspended by towers or poles. ...

(bundle conductors) for high-voltage and ultrahigh-voltage

power transmission Power transmission is the movement of energy from its place of generation to a location where it is applied to perform useful Mechanical work, work. Power (physics), Power is defined formally as units of energy per unit time. In SI units: :\text ...

. He also built the first

hydrogen Hydrogen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the lightest and abundance of the chemical elements, most abundant chemical element in the universe, constituting about 75% of all baryon, normal matter ...

-cooled three-phase motor in Austria. In 1965, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Vienna University of Technology.''This article incorporates information from the corresponding article in the

German Wikipedia The German Wikipedia () is the German-language edition of Wikipedia, a free and publicly editable online encyclopedia. Founded on 16 March 2001, it is the second-oldest Wikipedia edition (after the English Wikipedia). It has articles, ma ...

References

1898 births 1971 deaths Austrian electrical engineers People from Zwettl TU Wien alumni {{Austria-engineer-stub