William D. Coolidge

William D. Coolidge (1873 to 1975) was an American electrical engineer and physicist whose name is inseparably linked with the X-ray tube, popularly called the Coolidge tube. His invention completely changed how X-rays are generated, and it remains the model on which X-ray tubes for medical use are patterned. Born in Hudson, Massachusetts, he graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1896, majoring in electrical engineering, and received his doctorate from the University of Leipzig in 1899. He returned to MIT as an instructor and later assistant professor, then joined the research laboratory of the General Electric Company in 1905, where early in his career he played a major role in developing the modern incandescent lamp. He also invented ductile tungsten.