Mária Telkes

Mária Telkes (born December 12, 1900, Budapest, Austria-Hungary [now in Hungary]—died December 2, 1995, Budapest) was a Hungarian-born American physical chemist and biophysicist best known for her invention of the solar distiller and the first solar-powered heating system designed for residences. She also invented other devices capable of storing energy captured from sunlight.

Telkes, daughter of Aladar Telkes and Maria Laban de Telkes, was raised in Budapest. She studied physical chemistry at the University of Budapest, graduating with a B.A. in 1920 and a Ph.D. in 1924. She became an instructor at the institution in 1924 but decided to immigrate to the United States after visiting a relative, who served at the time as the Hungarian consul in Cleveland. In 1925 she accepted a position as a biophysicist for the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, where she worked with American surgeon George Washington Crile to create a photoelectric device that recorded brain waves.

Telkes became an American citizen in 1937. That same year she became a research engineer at Westinghouse Electric, where she developed instruments that converted heat into electrical energy; however, she made her first forays into solar energy research in 1939. That year, as part of the Solar Energy Conversion Project at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), she worked on thermoelectric devices powered by sunlight. Telkes was assigned to the U.S. Office of Scientific Research and Development during World War II, and it was there that she created one of her most important inventions: a solar distiller capable of vaporizing seawater and recondensing it into drinkable water. Although the system was carried aboard life rafts during the war, it was also scaled up to supplement the water demands of the Virgin Islands. She remained at MIT after the war, becoming an associate research professor in metallurgy in 1945.

Until the end of her career, Telkes continued to develop solar-energy applications and received several patents for her work. Together with American architect Eleanor Raymond, she designed and constructed the world’s first modern residence heated with solar energy. The house was built in Dover, Massachusetts, in 1948. Boxlike solar collectors captured sunlight and warmed the air in a compartment between a double layer of glass and a black sheet of metal. Warmed air was then piped into the walls, where it transferred heat to Glauber’s salts (crystallized sodium sulfate) for storage and later use. She improved upon existing heat-exchanger technology to create solar stoves and solar heaters, receiving a $45,000 grant from the Ford Foundation in 1953 to create a universal solar oven that could be adapted for use by people living at all latitudes. She also worked to develop materials capable of enduring the temperature extremes of space. In 1980 she assisted the U.S. Department of Energy in the development of the world’s first solar-electric residence, which was built in Carlisle, Massachusetts.

In 1952 Telkes became the first recipient of the Society of Women Engineers Achievement Award. In 1977 she received a lifetime achievement award from the National Academy of Sciences Building Research Advisory Board for her contributions to solar-heated building technology and the Charles Greeley Abbot Award from the American Solar Energy Society.