Explore this section
Members and registered users
Find out about the preferential rates and generous discounts available to IET members as part of our Member Rewards scheme.
Seize control of your professional life with the IET Career Manager, our innovative online professional development tool.
Guidance and support to enable IET members to undertake planned and structured Initial Professional Development (IPD) and Continuing Professional Development (CPD).
Lead by example. Inspire the next generation. Help to shape the profession.
Explore this section
Search today for your next engineering role on Engineering & Technology Jobs, the job board hosted by the IET.
Whether you design, install or maintain LED lighting systems, the IET's new Code of Practice will help build knowledge and confidence in this increasingly popular technology.
Access a wealth of digital content on the IET Digital Library, including over 400 ebooks in a range of specialist subject areas including Radar, Power, Control and many more…
The essential directory for buyers and suppliers of engineering and technology products and services. Start your search.
Explore this section
IET Communities provide like-minded people with opportunities to share ideas, collaborate, learn and network. With more than 100 Local and Technical Networks around the world, you can feel confident of finding a community that suits your interests.
Volunteering can enhance your career development, is a personally rewarding experience and also benefits your Community
MyCommunity, the IET's professional network and collaboration platform, enabling you to connect, interact and exchange knowledge with your peers
Explore this section
Highlighted events
25 February 2015 | One Birdcage Walk, London
5 March 2015 | University of Warwick, UK
22 - 24 September 2015 | Holiday Inn Birmingham City Centre, Birmingham, UK
19 May 2015 | The Midland Hotel, Manchester, UK
Professor William Webb
Sir John O'Reilly
Explore this section
IET corporate news and activities, plus comment and reaction on engineering and technology issues.
Read what the media is saying about the IET and our activities.
We can provide independent experts to talk to the media on a range of engineering and technology related subjects.
Advice and support to IET members on promoting IET activities via the media and social media.
Key topics offer summaries of the IET’s positions on many of the most important policy topics.
The IET represents the views of its members on a wide range of professional and technological issues.
Offering unbiased, independent, evidence based policy advice.
The engineering profession speaking with one voice on key issues relating to engineering.
Biographical information on W.E. Ayrton, electrical engineer and member of the first Science Abstracts committee.
William Edward Ayrton, F.R.S. was born in London on 14 September 1847.
The son of a barrister, he studied mathematics at University College, London and later electricity at Glasgow under W. Thomson (Lord Kelvin).
In 1873, after successful service with the Indian Telegraph Company and a year with the Great Western Railway, he was appointed to the first Chair in Natural Philosophy and Telegraphy at the Imperial Engineering College, Tokyo.
At the the Imperial Engineering College, he worked with John Perry, Professor of Engineering, on a variety of subjects including dielectric constants of gases; viscosities of dielectrics and terrestrial magnetism.
On his return to London, he took several academic posts: Professor at the City and Guilds of London Institute (1879), Finsbury Technical College (1881) and Central Technical College (1884) becoming an outstanding teacher of electrical subjects often using self-made apparatus in his classes.
In 1879, Ayrton was the first to advocate power transmission at high voltage. In conjunction with John Perry (who had rejoined him at Finsbury), he invented many electrical measuring instruments including a spiral-spring ammeter and wattmeter. They also worked on railway electrification and produced a dynamometer. In 1882 they produced the first electric tricycle.
In 1898, William Ayrton was a member of the editorial committee for the first issue of Science Abstracts published by The Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE).
From 1904 until 1908, the year of his death, Ayrton and his second wife, Phoebe Marks (known as Hertha Ayrton, found fame for her work on the electric arc and being the first woman member of the Institution), were sponsored by the Admiralty to work on the electric searchlight.
