page_title: Heinrich Hertz
section_title: Legacy and honors
hierarchical_section_title: Heinrich Hertz / Legacy and honors
caption_attribution_description: English: 1994 Deutsche Bundespost postage stamp honouring Heinrich Hertz
context_page_description: Heinrich Rudolf Hertz was a German physicist who first conclusively proved the existence of the electromagnetic waves predicted by James Clerk Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism. The unit of frequency, cycle per second, was named the "hertz" in his honor.
context_section_description: Heinrich Hertz's nephew Gustav Ludwig Hertz was a Nobel Prize winner, and Gustav's son Carl Helmut Hertz invented medical ultrasonography. His daughter Mathilde Carmen Hertz was a well-known biologist and comparative psychologist. Hertz's grandnephew Hermann Gerhard Hertz, professor at the University of Karlsruhe, was a pioneer of NMR-spectroscopy and in 1995 published Hertz's laboratory notes.
  The SI unit hertz (Hz) was established in his honor by the International Electrotechnical Commission in 1930 for frequency, an expression of the number of times that a repeated event occurs per second. It was adopted by the CGPM (Conférence générale des poids et mesures) in 1960, officially replacing the previous name, "cycles per second" (cps).
  In 1928 the Heinrich-Hertz Institute for Oscillation Research was founded in Berlin. Today known as the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, Heinrich Hertz Institute, HHI.
  In 1969, in East Germany, a Heinrich Hertz memorial medal was cast. The IEEE Heinrich Hertz Medal, established in 1987, is "for outstanding achievements in Hertzian waves [...] presented annually to an individual for achievements which are theoretical or experimental in nature".
  In 1980, in Italy a High School called "Istituto Tecnico Industriale Statale Heinrich Hertz" was founded in the neighborhood of Cinecittà Est, in Rome.
  A crater that lies on the far side of the Moon, just behind the eastern limb, is named in his honor. The Hertz market for radio electronics products in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, is named after him. The Heinrich-Hertz-Turm radio telecommunication tower in Hamburg is named after the city's famous son.
  Hertz is honored by Japan with a membership in the Order of the Sacred Treasure, which has multiple layers of honor for prominent people, including scientists.
  Heinrich Hertz has been honored by a number of countries around the world in their postage issues, and in post-World War II times has appeared on various German stamp issues as well.
  On his birthday in 2012, Google honored Hertz with a Google doodle, inspired by his life's work, on its home page.
caption: Heinrich Hertz
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