History of Croatian Science, 20th–21st centuries

Rudolf Fizir (1891-1960), born in Ludbreg in Croatia, built 18 airplanes. He was awarded the Paul Tissandier Diploma by the F.A.I. (Fédération Aeronautique Internationale), for his achievements in developing world aviation. With his two-wing aircraft Fizir, constructed in 1925, he won the first prize at the Petite Entente contest in 1927. From then on began his serial aircraft production in cooperation with well known companies: the Fizir-Mercedes, the Fizir-Wirght, the Fizir-Titan, the Fizir-Kastor, the Fizir-Gypsi, and the half-metallic Fizir-Jupiter.

He also reconstructed some models into hydroplanes. His great success was Fizir FN, two-wing, two-seat aircraft with double commands (more than hundred planes!). It was used as instruction plane even 30 years after the end of the WW2! In 1931 he constructed amphibious aircraft, Fizir 1931 (see above), intended for landing on rivers, lakes and the sea. He also constructed a tourist aircraft as early as 1935. He also constructed parachutes, like its inventor Faust Vrancic. During the WW2 he worked in Zagreb, lecturing aircraft construction at the Technical Faculty.

Fizir FP.2

After the WW2 he worked in the Industrial Research Institute in Zagreb. For more information see CROATIA, in flight magazine, Autumn 2000, pp. 89-99.

Lit.

• Leonard Eleršek:  Homo Volans / rani hrvatski avijatičari 1554.-1927., 2. dopunjeno izdanje, Zagreb 2010.
• Juraj Mužina and Darko Žubrinić: Rudolf Fizir

Jacob Jake Matijevic (1947-2012), of Croatian origin, PhD in Mathematics from the University of Chicago, was NASA engineer and a father of Curiosty rover which successfully landed on the planet Mars in 2012. NASA named several landmarks, including "Matijevic Hill" and "Jake Matijevic" rock, for him on the planet Mars.

Ivan Šarić, constructor of early airplanes, had been flying in Subotica in 1913 (only 10 years after brothers Wright, and three years after Penkala in Zagreb).

George M. Skurla (1921-2001), after completing his college training, he joined the Aircraft Engineering Corporation as an apprentice engineer. In 1965, he became director of operations for Grumman at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) Kennedy Space Center (KSC). In that position, he brought together the 1,600-man Grumman team responsible for the final assembly, test and pre-launch checkout for the Apollo lunar module vehicle. Skurla led the team that built the historic Apollo 11 lunar landing module. The lunar modul spacecraft, which was designed, developed and produced by Grumman co., was the final stage in NASA's Apollo Program which landed American astronauts on the surface of the moon.

SKURLA, GEORGE Appolo Space Program George Skurla, 80, a retired Grumman Corporation president known for his leadership during the heady days when the company's lunar module landed on the moon, died September 2, 2001 at a hospital in Melbourne, Florida. He had pneumonia. Grumman's lunar modules shuttled Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin from Apollo 11 toward the "giant leap for mankind" in 1969 and, a year later, returned the crew of Apollo 13 to Earth when their main spacecraft became disabled. As director of operations at Kennedy Space Center in Florida in the late 60’s, Mr. Skurla managed 1,600 employees responsible for assembling and testing the lunar modules from parts made at Grumman headquarters in Bethpage, N.Y. He began his 42-year career at Grumman in 1944 as an apprentice engineer and was named company president in 1985. Grumman has since become part of Los Angeles-based Northrop-Grumman. George Skurla was a Croatian-American whose parents were from Herzegovina. As head of Grumman, he was one of the key men behind the Appolo program. Source Adam Eterovich Bracanin

Skurla Hall is the home of the School of Aeronautics at Florida Tech.
It contains many classrooms, computer labs, faculty offices, and a large auditorium.

Lucas Kraglievich (1886-1932) was distinguished Argentinean paleontologist of Croatian descent.

Dragutin Gorjanovic Kramberger (1856-1936) was a professor of geology and paleontology at the University of Zagreb. He discovered the richest collection of remains of Diluvial Neanderthal people in the world on a site not far from Zagreb (Krapina).

Dragutin Gorjanovic Kramberger, links

Jakov Radovcic distinguished Croatian paleonthologist and an expert in the Neanderthal culture

Neanderthal Jewelry Is Just as Fiercely Cool as You’d Imagine

White-tailed eagle talons from the Krapina Neandertal site in Croatia, dating to approximately 130,000 years ago (discovered alreay by Dragutin Gorjanovic Kramberger), were shown by a group of scientist in 2013 to serve as a jewelry. This is the oldest jewelry known in human history.

Emilio Marin, associé étranger de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 2003 (archéologie et histoire)

Željko Ivezić, Croatian scientist and a leading expert in astronomy in the world.

Lit. [Janko Herak, pp. 93-100]

Mario Juric is distinguished Croatian astrophysicist, working in the USA

A great merit in popularizing astronomy and technical sciences in Croatia has Oton Kučera (1857-1931) with his numerous published books and articles. See [ppt1] and [ppt2] (in Croatian;  many thanks to Tatjana Kren and Branko Hanzek for permission). Upon the suggestion of Oton Kucera, an asteroid (589), discovered by his colleague August Kopff in Heidelberg in 1906, was named Croatia. It is interesting that a granddaughter of Oton Kucera has the first name Kroacija. We mention in passing that there is another asteroid, named after William Feller, distinguished Croatian - American mathematician (by NASA, in 1996).

Miroslav Radman élu à l'Académie des Sciences, France, 2002 (Biologie cellulaire et moléculaire)

Nenad Ban is distinguished Croatian scientist, an expert in biochemistry and biophysics. He is recipient of the Heinrich Wieland Prize 2010 for his work on key structures in human fatty acid synthesis. According to Professor Konrad Sandhoff from Bonn, Germany, his work is "truly pioneering" and "great achievement". Professor Ban is working at ETH in Zurich, Switzerland. It is interesting that he and his group of young scientists had two publications in the same issue of "Science".

Nenad Ban has a great merit for solving the problem of structure of the ribosome. More precisely, he solved the structure of the so called large ribosome unit (Ban's structure). See[ Janko Herak, pp. 56].

Lit. [Janko Herak, pp. 53-58]

Ivan Gutman, born in the city of Sombor, is distinguished Croatian expert in Mathematical Chemistry, prolific author of more than 1200 scientific articles, a member of editorial boards of numerous professional journals, professor of Physical Chemistry at the University of Kragujevac, Serbia. He has two PhD's: in Chemistry (from the University of Zagreb) and in Mathematics (from the University of Belgrade). Among his monographs we mention

• A. Groavac, I, Gutman, N. Trinajstić: Topological Approach to the Chemistry of Conjugated Moleculs,
• Xueliang Li, Ivan Gutman: Mathematical Aspects of Randić-type Molecular Structure Descriptors, Mathematical Chemistry Monographs, University of Kragujevac, 2006

He is a member of the Intenational Academy of Mathematical Chemistry, of the Academy of Nonlinear Sciences in Moscow and of Academia Europaea.

Franjo Hanaman (1878-1941), chemist and metallurgist, distinguished professor of the University of Zagreb, invented together with Aleksandar Just the first economical electric bulb with wolfram filament. During 1910, when Hanaman sojourned in the USA, his patent rights have been bought by the General Electric Co. During his visit, he met Nikola Tesla.

William David Coolidge, american physicist and since 1932 director of the scientific laboratory of General Electric Co, wrote on the occasion of Hanaman's 50th birthday and the then 25th anniversary of his first patent the following in his letter sent to Professor Vladimir Njegovan (see [M. Kastelan-Macan, p. 53]):

Allow me, however, to take this opportunity to express my keen appreciation of the pioneer work of Professor Hanaman in the tungsten lamp field. To him and to Dr. Just belongs the honor of being the path finders who led the world to a wonderful new light.

Let me also pay my tribute to Professor Hanaman's sterling character and lovable nature. I feel fortunate indeed in being able to count him as one of my very good friends.

For more detailed information, see Marija Kastelan-Macan: Franjo Hanaman, FKIT, Zagreb 2017.

Billions of electric bulbs worldwide, with wolfram filament, have been produced during the past hundred hears (from the beginning of 20th to the beginning of 21st centuries), based on the patents of Hanaman and Just.

One of the most outstanding representatives of photochemistry was Ivan Plotnikov (1878-1955), a Russian emigrant to Croatia (1918) and a professor of physical chemistry in Zagreb.

Vladimir Prelog, (1906-1998, a Croat born in Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina, studied in Zagreb), obtained the Nobel Prize for discoveries in organic chemistry, worked at the Technische Hochschule in Zurich, 1975. As a young boy he was a stipendist of Napredak, Croatian cultural society in Bosnia and Herzegovina. See Prelog links. He wrote his authobiography, Vladimir Prelog: My 132 Semesters of Studies of Chemistry, American Chemical Society, Washington DC 1991 (second edition by Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998). Prelog was among 112 Nobel Prize winner who signed and appeal For Peace in Croatia in 1992. He himself expressed on numerous occasions his public protest against the aggression on Croatia and BiH during the 1990s.

Milan Randić, distinguished international expert in Mathematical Chemistry and a founder of The International Academy of Mathematical Chemistry, is best known for his connectivity index, now known as the Randić index. He studied Theoretical Physics in Zagreb and founded Theretical Chemistry group at the Rudjer Boskovic Institute in Zagreb. He is distinguished professor at the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa, USA.

Lavoslav Ruzicka (1887-1976, born in Vukovar, of a Czech father and a Croat mother, attended the gymnasium of Osijek), obtained the Nobel Prize for discoveries in organic chemistry, professor at the Technische Hochschule in Zurich, Switzerland 1939; see Ruzicka links.

Daniel D. Gajski, a hero of Computer Science. Prof.Dr. Franz Ramming wrote the following: "... Daniel Gajski did not just light the fire, he also fuelled it substantially. During the last three decades he achieved pioneering results. He was a principal contributor to the areas Silicon Compilation, High-Level Synthesis, and System-Level Design. ..."

Lit. [Janko Herak, pp. 79-86]

Brian Krzanich Intel CEO leads an organization of more than 100,000 employees

Angelo (Anđelko) Zgorelec (1940-2025), founder of the first Computer Science journal in Europe: Personal Computer World (London, 1978)

• Rudjer Bošković
• Spiridion Gopčević (Leo Brenner)
• Nikola Tesla
• Andrija Mohorovičić

Ivan Vucetic (1858-1925), in Argentina known as Juan Vucetich, was a criminologist and anthropologist born on the island of Hvar, in that time called Lessina. He was one of the pioneers of the scientific datiloscopy (identification by fingerprints) and occupied the position of the director of the Center for Daktiloscopy in Buenos Aires. His method of identification was in use throughout South America. Vucetic was also the one who introduced the notion of daktiloscopy in 1920, now in current use worldwide.

Ivan Vucetic devised an original instrument for classification of fingerprints called dactilonome.

The police school in La Plata is bearing his name: Escuela de policia Juan Vucetich, as well as the Argentinean Police museum, and even a High Technical Institute Juan Vucetich. See his biography

Vida y obra de Juan Vucetich in Spanish,

Lit.

• Ivan Vucetic, Juan Vucetich 1858.-1925. [PDF], concept author & event coordinator Ljerka Galic, Croatian Heritage Foundation, Zagreb 2008., ISBN 978-953-6525-47-8
• Ivan Vučetić - Sherlok Holmes and forensic pioneer

Hrvoje Babić (1929-2015), with Miroslav Sedlaček introduced the concept of mictrotron.

Vojislav Bego (1923-1999) a leading expert in voltage balance, constructor of Bego's Weigh

Antun Dolenc (1905-1984), in 1939 introduced for the first time laquered isolation of wires (instead of cotton isolation) for asychronous motors, which improved the production of motors first in Zagreb, and soon became a standard in Siemens and throughout the world to these days.

Branko Katalinic, professor of robotics at the Technical University in Vienna, Austira, has founded a prestigeous international association DAAAM in 1990. Among the past conferences, four of them have been organized in Croatia until 2009: in Dubrovnik, twice in Opatija and in Zadar. The DAAAM comprises more than fifty member states and hundreds of international organizations.

Branko Leskovar 1930-2016 distinguished Croatian-American expert in Electrical Engineering & Electronics - his methods have been accepted world-wide by government and industrial laboratories.

Miroslav Sedlaček (1925-2017), expert in accelerator technology, Electron Physics and in vacuum and gasous devices

In 1997 Tomislav Uzelac, a student of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computin of the Universty of Zagreb, Croatia, invented the AMP Playback Engine, the first successful MP3 player. Two students from the University of Utah adapted it to work on Windows, and called it WinAMP.

Bernardo Kohnen (1876-1937), German by birth, born near Hannover, moved as a young boy with his parents to Bosnia, where he attended the famous Jesuit gymnasium in Travnik. He devoted about 30 years of his life to the evangelization and study of life of Shiluks (southern Sudan), at that time one of the most isolated tribes in Africa, and other Nilot tribes (Denka, Nuer, etc).

"Father Shiluk", as he was called by the Shiluks themselves, wrote first dictionaries, grammars, and translated holly and liturgical books into their language, praised by the english scholars. Although born as German, Kohnen spoke and wrote in Croatian. He donated some of the artifacts of African culture to the Zagreb Ethnographic museum. See [Zoric].

As an explorer, Dragutin Lerman (1863-1918) was a member of Stanley's expedition to Congo (Zaire), and a commissary (Commissaire General) of the Belgian government in Congo. By the end of his career the Belgian king Leopold conferred the knighthood of Lion's order on him. And the famous Stanley wrote: "The Croat is energetic, cautious, in high spirits..." It is interesting that in 1882 Lerman discovered huge waterfalls on the river of Kwil, which he named the Zrinski Waterfalls (Zrinski chutes), in honour of a famous Croatian family of rulers. He donated about 500 artifacts related to various traditional African cultures to the Ethnographic museum in Zagreb.

Misionar na Gornjem Nilu, Damir Zoric

Stjepan Mlakic (1844-?) Bosnian Croat born in Fojnica, a missionary in Africa among the tribes of Shiluks and Nuers in Sudan, like his colleague Kohnen. Very educated, besides his native Croatian he spoke German, Italian, English and Arabian, to which he added the language of Nilot tribe of Nuers. His letters to his brother (also a priest) in Bosnia witness about his very close contacts with Africans. It is worth to note his discovery that in Egypt, near the town of Korsko, there is the village of Ibrim, where used to live Bosnian Muslims (!) inhabited there by a Turkish sultan. He donated a rich collection of artifacts of African culture to the Zagreb Ethnographic museum. See [Zoric].

Brothers Mirko (Karlovac 1871-Peru, 1913) and Stevo Seljan (Karlovac 1876-Ouro Preto, Brazil 1936) spent several years in Ethiopia carrying out geomorphological, climatological and ethnographic investigations.

They occupied an important position at the court of Ethiopian Emperor Menelik II. Later they went to South America, where they founded the society La Mission Cientifica Croata Mirko y Stevo Seljan and organized some expeditions, especially in Peru, Chile and Brazil (in the region of the Amazon).

Their most important book is Mirko and Stevo Seljan, El Salto del Guayra, 1905, Buenos Aires. Origianlly written in Croatian, so that it could be printed in the United Kingdom of Croatia, Slavonia, and Dalmatia, it was translated already in 1905 into French. In 1913 Stevo Seljan was elected as a honorary member of the Mexican Geographical Socitey.

In 1898, at the age of 27, Mirko Seljan walked 2800 km from St. Petersburg (Russia) to Paris (France), in just 110 days. In this way, he earned the title Champion Globetrotter. However, the greatest Croatian globetrotter (and probably of entire history) was Josip (Joe, Joseph) Mikulec.

Ivan Dellitti (19/20th ct) from the city of Senj in Croatia discovered the method of production of acetylene gas. He also constructed the first acetylne gas lamp (carbide lamp).

Lit.

Jakov Kuljiš from the island of Vis (in the fishing town of Komiža) patented his first acetylene lamp for the needs of night fishing in 1898 (lov ribe "na sviću"). Due to this patent, in 1903, he obtained a recognition in the USA by becoming a honorary citizen of this state. His patent soon started to be used in coal mines as well, as miner's lamp.

Lit.

Petar Dragić, born in 1873 in the town of Crikvenica on Croatian coast, introduced the purse seine net (in Croatian: mreža plivarica), the precursor of today’s monster nets. He died in 1831 in San Pedro in the USA. His method, introduced in California (and called Californian method), enabled tuna fishig since 1917 in the open sea, and not just along the coast. This method revolutionized fishing throughout the world.

Lit. Joško Božanić: Terra nauta / Doprinos hrvatskih ribara svjetskom ribarstvu, Sušačka revija 17(2009) 65, str. 23–37.

Mario Puretic (1917-1993, born in Croatia in the town of Sumartin on the island of Brac; his true name was Mario Puratic), revolutionarized the technology of pulling out fishing nets from the sea by his construction of what is now known as the Puretic Power Block in 1950s. Until then fishing nets had to be manually drawn by eight to ten people, which was an extremely difficult job. The Marco Seattle company developed Puretic's idea, and it soon became a standard mean of fishing in the whole world.

In 1975, the United States Patent Office conferred him a special recognition for his patent which revolutionarized the fishing technology worldwide. He was elected among hundred greatest inventors of the 20th century in the USA.

In 1972 the National Bank of Canada issued a new series of 5 dollar banknotes with the Puretic Power Block on a fishing boat drawn on the reverse side! See here:

When Mario Puretic died, his remains were brought from the USA to his native town of Sumartin in 1994. He was an honorary citizen of many countries, including Island (many thanks to Ms Nena Kazulin, USA, for this information).

For more details see

• Adam Eterovic: Mario Puretic, the King of Purse Seine Fishing
• Mario Puratic (in Croatian)

From Marco Seattle web site: No single invention has contributed more to the success of purse seine net hauling than Marco's extensive line of Power Blocks. First introduced in the 1950's the Puretic Power Block line became the linch-pin in the mechanization of purse seining. Combined with fluid hydraulic power technology and new large synthetic nets, it changed the whole character of purse seine fishing. From those early days the Marco Power Block has undergone many design improvements to provide the widest available range of sizes and power options to match changing requirements.

MARIO PURATIĆ
1904 - 1903

ALLEVIATED THE LIFE OF MARINERS THROUGHOUT THE WORLD
BY HIS PURETIC POWER BLOCK.
HE LIVED FOR A LONG TIME IN THE USA,
HOMESICKED FOR HIS NATIVE LAND.

REST IN GOD'S PEACE

MIRJANA AND JAKOV MAMIĆ

Ribarski uređaj PURETIC POWER BLOCK je namijenjen za izvlacenje i prikupljanje mreze na ribarskim brodovima.

Hrvatska numizmatička kovanica "Puratićev kolotur", 100 EUR (Croatian numismatic coin).
Zahvaljujem g. Andreju Kundihu na ovoj informaciji.

Mislav Ježić

Tefko Saracevic, Professor at the University of Rutgers, USA, was born in Croatia's capital Zagreb where he completed his studies of Electrical Engineering. He is distinguished international expert in Information Sciences.

Agabekov SA is world's famous company seated in Geneva, Switzerland, dealing with exterior lighting design. Mr Youri Agabekov, the founder of the company, has Croatian roots: his father is Ladislav Žerjavić, from Hrvatsko Zagorje (village of Mače) near Zagreb. His products have been used to cover with soft lighting such buildings like (photos by kind permission of Mr. Youri Agabekov):

• the Vatican
• Louvre, Paris
• Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow
• Saint Michel Bridge, Paris
• Palace of Sponza in Dubrovnik, Croatia
• Villa Astra in Lovran, Croatia
• Guernica by P. Picasso, Paris
• College de France, Paris
• Kingston Bridge, London
• Siltassari and Pitkäslita Bridges in Helsinki (Finland)
• Museum Arqueologic de Catalunya and Cathedral of Barcelona
• Cathedral of Palma de Mallorca, Spain
• Queen's Residence "Parlement" in Holland
• Princely Palace of Monaco
• National Museum Singapore
• Palacio National Mexico
• Banque Européenne in Bruxelles (Belgium)
• National Bank of Greece in Athens
• Bank of Luxemburg, etc.

Mr Youri Agabekov is a Croat born in Russia, living in Switzerland (Geneva) and in Croatia (Zagreb). His company, Agabekov SA, has 80 representatives throughout the world. Here is the logo of the company devoted to his wife Branka:

Jaroslav Havliček was born in Croatia, in Garesnica (1879 - 1950), of the Czech nationality. His steam boiler fed by coal powder represented a revolution in building large power supplies. A reputed journal Applied Mechanic's Review included him among 10 most important personalities in the history of energetics (besides Volta, Fermi, Edison, Tesla). His major inventions were completed during his stay in Brno (Czechia). Since 1919 he was a professor in Zagreb.

Ivan Hrvoić (1937) is Croatian scientist, inventor and entrepreneur, born and educated in Croatia, since 1972 living in Canada.  

In 1980 he incorporated his own company GEM systems, Inc. in Toronto, developing and producing magnetometers for surveys of the Earth magnetic field for magnetic observatories, searching for minerals, diamonds, oil, studies of volcanoes, earthquaqes, archaeological research, meteorolgy, etc. Today GEM System is the World leader in its special field and Ivan Hrvoić is one of the leading experts for measurements of Earth magnetic field.

Dr. Ivan Hrvoić is also distinguished Croatian benefactor. In the period of 1990-1995 he directed AMCA Toronto, The Association of Alumni and Friends of Croatian Universities in Toronto (AMCA - Alma Matris Croaticae Alumni).

Marcel pl. Kiepach (1894-1915) was probably the youngest inventor that Croatia ever had. He patented his first inventions in several European countries already at the age of 16, mostly in the field of electrical engineering. His inventions have been patented in France, Germany, England, Switzeralnd and in the USA.

Photo from www.krizevci.eu

His first invention (maritime gyrocompass, which shows the North irresepctive of surrounding metal objects or the influence of magnetic forces) was patented in 1916 in Berlin (Kaiseriches Patentamt) under No 246656, owner Marcel von Kiepach in Križevci, Kroatien.

Source genius-croatia.com

The same invention was patented in London already in 1911, under No 28696, owner Marcel de Kiepach, Theaterplatz (Kazališni trg) broj 8, Zagreb, Croatia, Austria, Landowner. In 1912, he patented his dynamo machine for vehicle lighting in Paris. Even today we can see his invention being used on bicycles.

Photo from www.krizevci.eu

Marcel died very young at the age of 21 as a volonteer in Poland in 1915 during the First World War. An extensive documentation about him and his patents can be seen in the City Museum of his native town of Krizevci. Today, the town of Križevci has the street named after him and the Marcel Kiepach Innovation Society.
 
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Kiepach
hr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Kiepach
prigorski.hr/marcel-kiepach-krizevci-12-veljace-1894-ruska-poljana-13-kolovoza-1915/
Zoran Homen: ZABORAVLJENI IZUMITELJ NA POLJU ELEKTROTEHNIKE [PDF]

Anthony Maglica, holder of hundreds of patents and trademarks, founded Mag Instrument, Inc, in Los Angeles in 1955, and designed Mag-Lite flashlight, which is now an American product icon, among 100 top products that "America makes best". The Maglite products have been honored by the Japan Institute of Design and the Museum for Applied Art in Germany. Mag Instrument donated thousands of flashlights to aid in the rescue efforts at the World Trade Center and Pentagon in 2001. Born in New York, and as a child raised in Croatia, Tony Maglica has plenty of other interests which include also the island of Zlarin, Croatia, where he grew up.

The service of buying parking tickets via mobile phones is today widespread worldwide. The service has been conceived and developed in Croatia.

Eduard (Slavoljub) Penkala (1871-1922), born in Slovakia to a Polish/Dutch family, became naturalized Croat when after his marriage his family immigrated to Zagreb. He invented the mechanical pen in 1906 and fountain pen in 1907 which are bearing his name "penkala" and now they are in everyday use.

His first invention was a resin bottle filled with hot water, called Termofor (hot water bottle), used in bed as "central heating" during cold nights.

Penkala invented a new plastic mass substance called ebonite, and used it for production of gramophone records. He then signed a contract with the Edison-Bell company, England, and a new company Edison-Bell-Penkala Ltd. was founded in Zagreb which started the production of gramophone records based on his original technology.

The Penkala factory in Zagreb in 1912, Branimirova street, had about 300 employees, with canteen, kindergaten, swimming pool, and even a football club Penkala. It was among largest factories for office equipment in the world.

Edison Bell Penkala gramophone record, exhibited in the Sajko Museum Collection, Novska, Croatia

www.toz-penkala.hr

• Gojko Nikolić: Eduard Slavoljub Penkala, Privlačica, Vinkovci 2021.
• Leonard Eleršek:  Homo Volans / rani hrvatski avijatičari 1554.-1927., 2. dopunjeno izdanje, Zagreb 2010.

In 1972 Hrvoje Šarić invented and patented the first professional synchro-rotational photo-camera (360-degree camera) in history. In 1988 he deviced the first electronical construction consisting of nine BETACAM videocameras, catching the range of the full circle. Saric's 360 degree film technology was exploited at 1988 and 2000 at EXPO exhibitions organized in Lisbon, Portugal, and in Hannover, Germany.

Croatian pavillion was the main event at the 1998 EXPO in Lisbon, Portugal, among others due to 360-degree film technology introduced by Hrvoje Saric.

Ralph Tony Sarich (born in 1938) is an Australian Croat who developed the Orbital Engine in 1972. He is a recipent of several prestigeous ingeneering awards like Australian Inventor of the Year 1972, Sir Lawrence Hartnett Inventors Award 1972, Churchill Medal, British Society of Engineers 1987 and Clunies Ross National Science and Technology Award 1991. His parents are Croatian immigrants to Australia.

See Orbital Engine Patent.

Mladen Bestvina delivered a plenary lecture at International Congress of Mathematicians for 2022

Stanko Bilinski's rhombic dodecahedron discovered in Croatia in 1960 and nicely described by Matt Parker

Danilo Blanusa (1903-1987), Croatian mathematician, professor at the University of Zagreb, was born in Osijek. He discovered a mistake in relations for absolute heat Q and temperature T in relativistic phenomenological thermodynamics, published by Max Planck in Annalen der Physik in 1908:

Blanusa's most important work is related to isometric immersions of two-dimensional Lobacevski plane into six-dimensional Euclidean space and generalizations. This result is included in authoritative Japanese mathematical encyclopedia Sugaku jiten published by Iwanami shoten, Tokyo, 1962, p. 612. His work about imbeddings of hyperbolic spaces into Euclidean spaces has been cited in 1956 by John Nash (well known mathematician, Nobel prize for economy; Blanusa is cited in his paper "The imbedding problem for Riemannian manifolds", Annals of Mathematics, Vol 63, No. 1, 1956, pp. 20-63).

His work in graph theory resulted with what is now known as

• Blanusa's Snark
• Blanusa's Snark at Wolfram Research
• Tomislav Petkovic: D. Blanusa’s formulae for heat and temperature transformations in relativistic thermodynamics and his correspondence with W. Pauli in 1948, [PPT]
• photos

Professor Suncica Canic Croatian-American mathematician uses math to build better stents

Jakša Cvitanic is Professor of Mathematical Finance at Caltech. Prior to joining Caltech in 2005, he held positions as Professor of Mathematics and Economics at USC and Associate Professor of Statistics at Columbia University. He is regarded as a leading expert in mathematical finance. Professor Cvitanic was born in the city of Split, Croatia, and completed his studies of mathematics at the University of Zagreb.

Professors Z. Drmac and K. Veselic received prestigeous SIAM math prize

Andrej Dujella is distinguished Croatian mathematician, expert in Number Theory (Diophantine equations and elliptic curves).

William Feller (Vilim, Willy, Willi, 1906-1970) is a well known name among mathematicians dealing with probability theory. He was born and educated in Zagreb as Vilim Feller, where he studied mathematics for two years (completing 4 semesters out of 8), and then in 1926 continued his studies at the University of Göttingen. By the end of the same year, at the age of 20, he defended his doctoral degree in mathematics. Göttingen at that time the strongest mathematical center in the world besides Paris.

He was a professor at the Universities of Kiel, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Lund, Providence, Princeton etc., a member of many scientific organizations. More than 150 mathematical notions bear his name, and here are just a few of them: Feller's process, Feller's transition function, Feller's semigroup, Feller's property. He is best known for his monograph "An Introduction to Probability Theory and its Applications", Volumes I and II, on 1153 pp., translated into Russian, Chinese, Castilian, Japanese, Hungarian and Polish. They are considered among the best mathematical textbooks written in the 20th century. At the International Congress of Mathematicians held in 1958 in Edinburgh, William Feller gave a plenary talk "Some new connections between probability and classical analysis."

For more information see William Feller (photo by Paul Halmos).

Feller was among those who initiated issuing the important Mathematical Reviews journal, and was its first executive editor (1944-1945). He worked with von Neumann, one of the creators of modern computers. Feller was awarded the National Medal of Science of the USA in 1969. He was in touch with his relatives in Zagreb, as well as with his colleagues at the University of Zagreb.

Joseph Doob, a renowned American mathematician, wrote about Feller the following:

Those who knew him personally remember Feller best for his gusto, the pleasure with which he met life, and the excitement with which he drew on his endless fund of anecdotes about life and its absurdities, particularly the absurdities involving mathematics and mathematicians. To listen to his lecture was a unique experience, for no one else could lecture with such intense excitement. No one could generated in himself as well as in his auditors so much intense excitement. In losing him, the world of mathematics has lost one of its strongest personalities as well as one of its strongest researchers.

Vilim Feller, extensive biography, with emphasis on his life in Zagreb, Croatia

Ferdinand Feller, the eldest brother of Vilim (William) Feller (1906-1970), is the author of the graphic sign of the Croatian optical industry Ghetaldus, named after Marinus Ghetaldus, that is, after Marin Getaldić. Photo by D.Ž. in the city of Rijeka. See also Elsa fluid.

Branko Grünbaum 1929—2018 distinguished American mathematician born in Croatia

Zvonimir Janko (born in 1932 in Croatia), studied mathematics and earned his PhD at the University of Zagreb. He is professor of mathematics at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, and his name is well known among experts in the theory of finite groups. Professor Janko discovered sporadic groups named J₁, J₂, J₃, and J₄ in his honour. They are called Janko groups.

The discovery of J₁ in 1964, more than a century after the discovery of the first sporadic group, launched the modern theory of sporadic groups. His group J4, discovered in 1976, has

86 775 571 046 077 562 880

elements. He delivered an invited lecture about his research at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Nice, France, 1970.

Lit.

• A.A. Ivanov (professor at Imperial College, London): The Fourth Janko Group (256 pp), Oxford Math. Monographs, 2005.
• Janko Groups at Wolfram MathWorld
• Janko Groups at Wikipedia
• [Janko Herak, pp. 101-108]
  

Sibe Mardesic (1927-2016), distinguished Croatian mathematician - international expert in the field of Topology, especially in Shape Theory.

Andro Mikelic 1956-2020 distinguished Croatian mathematician in France

Josip Pecaric's activities in Pakistan and Croatia from Mathematics to Croatian history

Drazen Prelec, born in Croatia's capital Zagreb in 1955, completed his studies of Applied Mathematics at Harvard University in 1978, and earned Ph.D in 1983 in Experimental Psychology. He is one of the leading experts of Neuroeconomics, where psychology and neuroscience intersect. Professor Prelec investigates both the development of normative decision theory and the exploration of the empirical failures of that theory. He is employed at MIT, holding three appointments: at the Department of Economics, Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, and at the Sloan School of Management.

Marko Tadić is distinguished Croatian mathematician, international expert for Representation theory of groups.

Marko Tadic Croatian mathematician delivered a lecture at IHES in Paris in 2018

Professors Z. Drmac and K. Veselic received prestigeous SIAM math prize

PLIVA is today the largest pharmaceutical company in Croatia and by sales, the largest in Central and Eastern Europe. Its best selling product is Sumamed antibiotic, also globaly known as Azythromicin.

• [Janko Herak, pp. 9-34]
• History of PLIVA (in Croatian)

One of our best theoretical physicists was Gaja Alaga (1924-1988), member of the Croatian Nobility from Backa and Bunjevci Croat.

He worked not only in Zagreb, but also at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, Berkeley, Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich etc. In 1955, in cooperation with K. Alder from Switzerland, A. Bohr from Denmark and B. Mottelson from the USA, he discovered the so called K-selection rules and intensity rules for beta and gamma transitions in deformed nuclei.

Nikola Cindro (1931-2001) was a Croatian physicist, descendant of very old Croatian Nobility from 8th century, from Croatian south (Split, Poljica). He was lecturing in Zagreb, Frankfurt, Paris and Strasbourg, and occupied the position of vice president of European Physical Society. His high quality work was recognized also abroad: he was a member of Italian physical society and Officier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Academiques, Paris, 1997.

Vladimir Jurko Glaser (1924-1984), theoretical physicist in the field of quantum fields theory, published one of the first monographs on Quantum Electrodynamics in the world (Kovarijantna kvantna elektrodinamika, Zagreb 1955, written in Croatian), at the age of 31. On p. 8 of the book he mentioned that the existence of positronium has been theoretically predicted by Stjepan Mohorovicic in 1934.

He was head of the Department of Theoretical Physics at the Rudjer Boskovic Institute in Zagreb. In 1957 he found permanent employment at the Department of Theoretical Physics in CERN in Geneva. Letters sent to Glaser by Wolfgang Pauli (nicknamed "the sword of theoretical physics") show Glaser's outstanding scientific status among theoretical physicists of his time. On the occasion of Glaser's death, during the commemoration held in CERN, prof. Henry Epstein said that he does not understand Croatian, but when in need for details and formulae, he prefers to consult Glaser's book (written in Croatian!), since it is reliable in all details. For more information see here (in Croatian).

Anthony Grbic is distinguished expert in metamaterials in the USA, recipient of the prestigious 2010 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers

Silvija Gradecak is a Croatian scientist at MIT, expert in Nano Structured Materials.

• Silvija Gradečak, National University of Singapore
• Silvija Gradečak
, biography and a list of her publications

Alex Grossmann (1930-2019), born in Croatia's capital Zagreb, he completed his study of Physics at the University of Zagreb and earned his PhD at the Rudjer Boskovic Institute. Since 1965 he was employed at the University of Marseille in France. This Croatian-French mathematician is considered as a father of Wavelet Theory, due to his groundbreaking joint work with French geophysicist Jean Morlet in 1984. He was a thesis advisor to distinguished Belgian physicist and mathematician Ingrid Daubechies (she was the first women president of the International Mathmatical Union).

Stanko Hondl (1873-1971), professor of physics at the University of Zagreb, has a great merit for popularizing Einstein's theory of relativity in Croatia. One of his students was William Feller, outstanding Croatian - American mathematician. Stanko Hondl was a student of Vinko Dvoržak at the University of Zagreb, who was a student of Ernst Mach at the University of Prague.

John Martinis, Croatian-American Physicist, born in 1958, was a winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2025. He is the fifth Croatian Nobel Prize winner. His both parents have Croatian roots. His father was a Croatian fisherman born on the island of Vis, in the town of Komiza.

Stjepan Mohorovičić (1880-1980), professor of physics at a grammar school in Zagreb, made a very important theoretical discovery ([Janko Herak, pp. 35-43]) of the positronium (rotational pair of electron and positron) as early as in 1934, published in Astronomishe Nachrichten, a prestigeous German scientific journal (precise reference is A. Mohorovicic, Astron. Nachr. 253, 94 (1934)). Its existence was confirmed experimentally in 1951 by Martin Deutsch, MIT physicist (and a member of Manhattan Project).

Lit.

• Mirko Orlić and Iva Vrkić: Bibliography of papers, reports and books published by Stjepan Mohorovičić [PDF], Geofizika, Vol. 32 Zagreb 2015, pp. 93-127
• Branko Hanžek: Dr. Stjepan Mohorovičić (1890. – 1980.) – promicatelj povezanosti hrvatske optičke industrije sa školstvom [PDF], Cris, god. XXIV., br. 1/2022., str. 152–161.
• Stjepan Mohorovicic

Davor Pavuna is distinguished expert in superconductivity. Jointly with Michel Cyrot , he is the author of the monograph Introduction to Superconducitivity and High-T_c Materials, published by World Scientific, 1992. Foreword to this book was written by P G de Gennes, Nobel Prize in Physics 1991. It has been used in about 4,000 university courses worldwide.

Max Planck's public lecture in Croatia's capital Zagreb in 1942

It is not widely known that Max Planck visited the Croatian capital Zagreb in the autumn 1942, when he was at the age of 84. He delivered a lecture at the University of Zagreb on September 15th, entitled "On the goals and boundaries of exact natural sciences" (sources: Priroda, Zagreb 1942, p 184, or Glasnik Mat. Fiz. Astr. 2, 1947, p 213). Max Planck spent a few days in Zagreb lodged at Hotel Esplanade (no traces of his stay in this hotel have been left after 1945). He visited the family of academician Stjepan Ivsic (at that time the Rector of the University of Zagreb), distinguished Croatian linguist and polyglot. (Many thanks to Mrs. Ljiljana Ivsic, granddaughter of Stjepan Ivisic, for this information, 2015 ; also according to her information, the family of Ivsic is in possession of a personal letter of Max Planck addressed to Stjepan Ivsic.)

• Boris Kožnjak: O predavanju Maxa Plancka »Smisao i granice egzaktne znanosti« u Zagrebu 15. rujna 1942. [PDF], Prilozi za istraživanje hrvatske filozofske baštine 45/1(89) (2019) 183–223

• Leo Randić, »Pola stoljeća boravka nobelovca Maxa Plancka u Zagrebu« [PDF], Priroda 82/3–4–5 (studeni–prosinac 1992, siječanj 1993), pp. 8–9.

Eduard Prugovečki (1937-2003), outstanding Croatian theoretical physicist, was born in Craiova, Romania (his mother was Romanian of Polish descent, and his father was Croatian). Having completed his primary and secondary education in Bucharest, he moved with his family to Zagreb, where he studied physics and started his early scientific career. In 1961 he was sent to Princeton where he received his Ph.D. in 1964. The next year he emigrated to Canada, and since then worked at the University of Toronto. Professor Prugovečki wrote four monographs, and the last two are

• Quantum Geometry (Kluwer, 1992)
• Principles of Quantum General Relativity (World Scientific, 1995)

He also published two futuristic novels: Memoirs for the Future (Cross Cultural Publications, Notre Dame, 2001), and Dawn of the New Man (Xlibris, Philadelphia, 2002).

Marin Soljacic is the author of the new Wireless Power Transfer, conceived in 1996. It attracted a substantial interest of the press (more than 200 articles in leading newspapers and radio-reports in numerous countries around the world, including: USA, Germany, Australia, Iran, India, Croatia, Greece, Spain, France, Italy, UK, Poland, Canada, the Netherlands, Thailand, Dominican Republic).

Marin Soljacic is a young Croatian physicist born in Croatia's capital Zagreb, where he completed his secondary school education. Dr. Soljacic is employed as researcher at the Department of Physics, Massachussetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA.

Lit. [Janko Herak, pp. 181-192]

Stefan Gelineo, Croat by birth, born in Stari Grad on the island of Hvar (1898-1971), studied in Leipzig and Vienna. He was the professor of physiology at the University of Belgrade (capital of Serbia and former Yugoslavia). He is internationally known by his contributions to the study of hypothermia, i.e. the study of vital functions under low temperatures.

One of the most famous Croatian scientists is Professor Balthazar, born in Zagreb in 1967:

Listen to the Professor Balthazar Theme Song composed by Tomica Simović, Zagreb:

Balt - Balthazar, Balt - Balthazar, Balthazaaar!

The Savannah nuclear ship, the first nuclear-powered merchant ship, was built to the plans of Erazmo Tićac. Born in Žurkovo in 1904, Erazmo went to schools in Žurkovo, Kostrena and Bakar, and made a career as a shipbuilding engineer in the USA. After the president Dwight Eisenhower announced his decision to build an experimental nuclear-powered merchant ship in 1955. 

The planning was entrusted to the firm The Sharp Brothers Inc., and Tićac became the leading planner. The ship was launched in 1959. On a plaque above the entrance to the ship’s lounge was written in golden letters: "Ben Tićac, naval architect". Erazmo got the name Ben when he received American citizenship. Source of the text www.kvarner.hr

For more information see www.croatia.org.

Henry Suzzallo (originally Zucalo, 1875-1933) was president of the University of Washington from 1915 to 1926. The central library of the University of Washington is called Suzzallo Library. His parents Petar and Ana Suzzallo, Croatians originating from Dalmatia, arrived to San Francisco in 1852.

On the birth certificate of Henry Suzzalo the names of his parents are given as Petar and Anna Zucalo. His godparents were also Croatians: John Lepes and Elisabeth Mahoni. Source: [Soric, p 105].

Marijan Zubanovic 1931-2016 Croatian technical thermodynamics expert in France

Petar Guberina

Verbotonal Method

Petar Guberina and his Verbotonal method described by Dr. Carl Asp in Zagreb

SUVAG

Petar Guberina, SUVAG

Mladen Lovrić founder of SUVAG Center in Yakutia in Russia 1990

Vladimir Shuvaev director of verbotonal institute in Vladivostok in Russia visited Croatia's capital Zagreb

Ludmila Rulenkova's book about the SUVAG verbotonal method translated from Russian into Croatian in 2015

Taras Belej painter from Ukraine: Croatia in my heart

Persons of Croatian origin - winners of Nobel Prizes:

1. Lavoslav Ružička, for Chemistry in 1939
2. Ivo Andrić, for Literature in 1961
3. Vladimir Prelog, for Chemistry in 1975
4. Paul Modrich, for Chemistry in 2015
5. John Martinis, for Physics in 2025.

Closely related to Croatian Jesuits was late Mother Teresa (Mother of Calcutta, of Albanian origin), Nobel Prize winner for Peace in 1979, and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1985 by the then president of the USA Ronald Reagan. Her spiritual father was Croatian Jesuit - Fr. Franjo Jambreković, SJ.