Heaviside (1888), Thomson (1889), Searle (1896)
In 1888, Oliver Heaviside investigated the properties of charges in motion according to Maxwell's electrodynamics. He calculated, among other things, anisotropies in the electric field of moving bodies represented by this formula:
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Consequently, Joseph John Thomson (1889) found a way to substantially simplify calculations concerning moving charges by using the following mathematical transformation:
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Thereby, inhomogeneous electromagnetic wave equations are transformed into a Poisson equation. Eventually, George Frederick Charles Searle noted in (1896) that Heaviside's expression leads to a deformation of electric fields which he called "Heaviside-Ellipsoid" of axial ratio .
Read more about this topic: History Of Lorentz Transformations
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