Oliver Heaviside, English engineer, mathematician, and physicist (died 1925)

Oliver Heaviside was a British mathematician and electrical engineer who invented a new technique for solving differential equations, independently developed vector calculus, and rewrote Maxwell's equations in the form commonly used today. He significantly shaped the way Maxwell's equations were understood and applied in the decades following Maxwell's death. Also, in 1893, he extended them to gravitoelectromagnetism, which was confirmed by Gravity Probe B in 2005. His formulation of the telegrapher's equations became commercially important during his own lifetime, after their significance went unremarked for a long while, as few others were versed at the time in his novel methodology. Although at odds with the scientific establishment for most of his life, Heaviside changed the face of telecommunications, mathematics, and science.