12 Lightning-Inspired Inventions That Changed Human History

LumenHarbor Updated: 2025-07-15

7. The Spark Plug: Igniting the Automotive Revolution

A vital part of internal combustion engines, the spark plug gets its operational concept straight from lightning. A spark plug generates a little, under control lightning-like spark to ignite the fuel mixture in an engine cylinder, much as a lightning bolt establishes a channel for electrical discharge across the air.
Designed in the 1860s, the spark plug was essential in the evolution of the contemporary car. It addressed one of the main difficulties in early engine design: how precisely and consistently ignite gasoline at set intervals? This development made internal combustion engines feasible and effective, hence enabling widespread production of vehicles.
The influence of the spark plug goes well beyond individual mobility. From lawnmowers to generators, it helped a great variety of gasoline-powered machines be developed, revolutionising construction, emergency services, and agriculture. Spark plugs were essential in the evolution of aircraft engines and hence in aviation, so enabling air travel and military aviation.
Reducing pollutants and increasing engine economy have come from constant progress in spark plug technology. Modern spark plugs provide higher fuel efficiency and less environmental effect by using sophisticated materials and exact designs to resist high temperatures and pressures.
The modest spark plug has quite literally fuelled the engines of progress by using the principle of electrical discharge seen in lightning, so profoundly changing modern transportation and industry.