Michael T. Wright

Michael T. Wright
Gearing layout proposed by Michael Wright for planetary indication on the Antikythera mechanism.
Born	1948 (age 68–69) London, England
Residence	England
Nationality	British
Fields	Mechanical engineering, history of science
Institutions	Science Museum, London Imperial College, London
Alma mater	University of Oxford University of London
Website www.mtwright.co.uk

Michael T. Wright FSA (born in 1948, London, England) was formerly curator of mechanical engineering at the Science Museum and later at Imperial College in London, England.

Michael Wright studied physics at the University of Oxford and history of technology at the University of London. He was a schoolmaster until 1971 when he joined the Science Museum in London, working there until 2004. For most of his career, Wright was the curator of mechanical engineering at the Science Museum. He then became an honorary research associate at the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at Imperial College London. He is also a fellow at the Society of Antiquaries of London.

Michael Wright made a study of the original fragments of the Antikythera mechanism, an Ancient Greek brass mechanism, together with Allan George Bromley. They used a technique called linear X-ray tomography which was suggested by retired consultant radiologist, Alan Partridge. For this, Wright designed and made an apparatus for linear tomography, allowing the generation of sectional 2D radiographicimages. Early results of this survey were presented in 1997, which showed that Price's reconstruction was fundamentally flawed.

Further study of the new imagery allowed Wright to advance a number of proposals. Firstly he developed the idea, suggested by Price in "Gears from the Greeks", that the mechanism could have served as a planetarium. Wright's planetarium not only modelled the motion of the Sun and Moon, but also the Inferior Planets (Mercury and Venus), and the Superior Planets (Mars, Jupiter and Saturn).