This is a list of Vietnamese inventions and discoveries which includes technological, cultural and historical inventions. This list is incomplete.
Academia
Brieskorn–Phạm manifold: a term for a mathematical object defined as the intersection of a small sphere around the origin with a complex hypersurface with singularities, essentially creating a "knot-like" structure in higher dimensions. Brieskorn-Phạm manifolds are important in the study of topology, particularly in the field of exotic spheres, as they can provide examples of smooth manifolds that are topologically equivalent to a standard sphere but have different differential structures. The term was first introduced in 1966 and was further studied and perfected by Vietnamese mathematician Frédéric Phạm.[1]
Circular law conjecture in random matrix theory: a conjecture, established by Terence Tao and Vietnamese mathematician Vũ Hà Văn, asserts that for large random matrices with i.i.d. entries of zero mean and unit variance, the scaled eigenvalues asymptotically follow a uniform distribution over the unit disk in the complex plane, regardless of the specific distribution of the matrix entries.[2]
Inverse Littlewood-Offord theorem: a result in additive combinatorics that addresses the structure of sets that exhibit concentration of linear combinations of elements. It builds on the classical Littlewood-Offord theorem, which estimates the probability that a random sum of weighted vectors lands in a small region. The theory was developed by Vietnamese mathematician Vũ Hà Văn and Terence Tao.[3]
Visual illustration of the Phong equation.Phong reflection model: an empirical model of the local illumination of points on a surface designed by the computer graphics researcher Bui Tuong Phong, who published it in his 1975 Ph.D. dissertation.[4][5] It was published in conjunction with a method for interpolating the calculation for each individual pixel that is rasterized from a polygonal surface model; the interpolation technique is known as Phong shading, even when it is used with a reflection model other than Phong's. Phong's methods have proven popular due to their generally efficient use of computation time per rendered pixel.
Proof of Ore's conjecture: As the commutator subgroup is generated by commutators, a perfect group may contain elements that are products of commutators but not themselves commutators. Øystein Ore proved in 1951 that the alternating groups on five or more elements contained only commutators, and conjectured that this was so for all the finite non-abelian simple groups. Ore's conjecture was finally proven in 2008 by Vietnamese mathematician Phạm Hữu Tiệp and colleagues.[10][11]
The Erdos-Folkman problem: Vietnamese mathematician Vũ Hà Văn solved the Erdos-Folkman problem in 2003, answering the following question in number theory: How dense should a set of positive integers be so that every sufficiently large integer can be represented as a subsum?
Arts
Tò He: a traditional toy for children made from glutinous rice powder in form of edible figurine such as animals, flowers or characters in folk stories.
Cải lương: a form of modern folk opera that blends southern Vietnamese folk songs, classical music, hát tuồng (a classical theatre form based on Chinese opera), and modern spoken drama. It originated in Southern Vietnam in the early 20th century and blossomed in the 1930s as a theatre of the middle class during the country's French colonial period. Cải lương is now promoted as a national theatrical form. Unlike the other folk forms, it continued to prove popular with the masses as late as the 1970s and the 1980s, although it is now in decline.[13][14]
A performance in the Thăng Long water puppet theatre in Hanoi.Chèo: a form of generally satirical musical theatre, often encompassing dance, traditionally performed by Vietnamesepeasants in northern Vietnam. It is usually performed outdoors by semi-amateur touring groups, stereo-typically in a village square or the courtyard of a public building, although it is today increasingly also performed indoors and by professional performers. Chèo has been a popular art form of the Vietnamese people for many generations and has fostered the national spirit through its lyrical content.
Tuồng a form of Vietnamese theatre. Hát tuồng is often referred to as classical "Vietnamese opera" influenced by Chinese opera. However, the first one to lay the foundation for the art of tuồng in Vietnam is Dao Duy Tu.[15] Under the Nguyen dynasty which he served for, tuồng reached its highest point and was favored by Nguyen kings. Many great playwrights including Đào Tấn were also in this time.
Water puppetry: (Vietnamese: Múa rối nước) a tradition that dates back as far as the 11th century, when it originated in the villages of the Red River Delta, in the north of the country. Vietnamese water puppetry is a variation on the ancient Asian puppet tradition.
Bro, a traditional musical instrument of the Bahnar, Sedang, Rhađe, Jarai, and Giẻ Xtiêng peoples of the Central Vietnam Highlands. It is a tube zither.
Dong Son Bronze drumBronze drum The Dong Son drum is an iconic artifact of ancient Vietnam from the Dong Son culture (roughly 7th century BCE to 1st century CE). Skillfully cast in bronze using the lost-wax technique, these large drums feature a distinctive tympanum decorated with geometric patterns, concentric circles, and motifs of birds, frogs, boats, and dancing figures. Beyond serving as musical instruments in rituals, they symbolized power, prosperity, and spiritual connection, acting as important status symbols for chieftains in early Vietnamese society.
Dan bauĐàn bầu a Vietnamese stringed instrument in the form of a monochord (one-string) zither.
Đàn đáy The đàn đáy dates back to the 15th century and became especially popular during the Mạc Dynasty. Its original name is “đàn không đáy” (literally “bottomless lute”), written in Chinese as 無題琴, because the instrument has no back or bottom.
Vovinam demonstration in France, 2014.Vovinam: a Vietnamese martial art founded by Nguyễn Lộc in 1938 with the intent of providing practitioners with an efficient method of self-defense after a short period of study. Nguyễn believed martial arts would contribute to freeing Vietnam from French colonial rule and from foreign invasions. Vovinam added elements of Chinese and Japanese systems to traditional Vietnamese martial arts systems, which were partially created as a response to the French occupation and to promote a sense of national identity for the Vietnamese people.[16][17] Hence, it is similar to Korean taekwondo in that it is an eclectic system with combined elements of Japanese and Chinese martial arts within an indigenous framework.[18]
Technology
A Chinese handcannon dated to 1424 with the flash pan adopted from Vietnamese handcannons after the Ming invasion of Vietnam in 1407
ATM: the co-inventor of the ATM is Vietnamese-born inventor Do Duc Cuong.[19]
Biological pest control: The first report of the use of an insect species to control an insect pest comes from "Nan Fang Cao Mu Zhuang" (南方草木狀 Plants of the Southern Regions) (c. 304 AD), attributed to Western Jin dynasty botanist Ji Han (嵇含, 263–307), in which it is mentioned that "Jiaozhi (modern Northern Vietnam) people sell ants and their nests attached to twigs looking like thin cotton envelopes, the reddish-yellow ant being larger than normal. Without such ants, southern citrus fruits will be severely insect-damaged".[20] The ants used are known as huang gan (huang = yellow, gan = citrus) ants (Oecophylla smaragdina). The practice was later reported by Ling Biao Lu Yi (late Tang dynasty or Early Five Dynasties), in Ji Le Pian by Zhuang Jisu (Southern Song dynasty), in the Book of Tree Planting by Yu Zhen Mu (Ming dynasty), in the book Guangdong Xing Yu (17th century), Lingnan by Wu Zhen Fang (Qing dynasty), in Nanyue Miscellanies by Li Diao Yuan, and others.[21]
Bulkhead (partition): an upright wall within the hull of a ship. A twin-hulled boat unearthed in Bac Ninh, Vietnam, features a series of bulkheads along each hull, which help strengthen the structure. The boat is dated to about 1,600–1,800 years ago[23]. If so, this would represent the earliest archaeological evidence of bulkheads found anywhere in the world to date.
Champa rice: a quick-maturing, drought resistant rice that can allow two harvests of sixty days each per growing season, introduced from the Champa Kingdom into Song China in the 11th century.
Copper sheathing: a method for protecting the hull of a wooden vessel from attack by shipworms, barnacles and other marine growth through the use of copper plates affixed to the surface of the hull, below the waterline. A number of Chinese sources attributed the origin of this technology to Northern Vietnam prior to the 4th century.
Flash pan: a small receptacle for priming powder on gun barrels. The flash pan probably first appeared on Vietnamese handcannons prior to 1407.
Habitify: a popular habit-tracking app that helps users form and maintain good habits. It provides statistics to help users track their progress and streaks. Founded by Vietnamese developer Peter Vu.[25][26]
Leeboard: To avoid leeward drift caused by the force of wind in sailing, the leeboard was invented; it was a board lowered onto the side of the ship opposite to the direction of the wind, helping the ship to stay upright and afloat even if the hull was breached. British writers Paul Johnstone and Sean McGrail state that an odd-looking second paddle on a bronze drum of the Dong Son culture (centered in the Red River Delta of northern Vietnam) may depict a leeboard in use as early as 300 BC.[29]
Manscaped: a male grooming company selling high-quality products targeted at pubichair removal. The company reached over a billion dollar valuation.[32] Founded by Vietnamese entrepreneur Paul Tran, who is currently the CEO.[33]
VNI: a software company known for developing an encoding (VNI encoding) and a popular input method (VNI Input) for Vietnamese. Developed by Vietnamese computer programmer Hồ Thành Việt.
Dancing Ballz: a mobilerhythm game developed by Vietnamese game developer Amanotes.[46] The gameplay consists of tapping the screen, where players have to control avatar characters such as animals, insects, discs and balls through line trails, avoiding or jumping over obstacles guided by marked points.
Magic Tiles 3: a music piano game created by Vietnamese developer Amanotes, the number one mobile music games publisher in the world.[48] Players need to tap tiles in time with the music, all while avoiding the white tiles. It's a game of skill and reflexes that is very similar to Piano Tiles.
Shadow Era: a free online digital collectible card game created by Vietnamese developer Wulven Studios. The game is supported on PC, iOS, and Android, and it was released on February 24, 2011.
Swing Copters: an arcade video game developed by Vietnamese video game developer .Gears, best known for Flappy Bird. The player controls a character wearing a helmet with helicopter rotors, and the player changes the direction of the character by tapping the screen.[49]
Tam cúc: a multi-trick card game popular in North Vietnam that uses a deck of 32 Chinese chess cards divided into two suits: red and black.[50][51]
Tiles Hop: a mobile music game created by Vietnamese developer Amanotes. Players control a ball that jump to the rhythm of thrilling EDM songs between different color changing tiles while avoiding obstacles along the way. Since the launch in 2018, Tiles Hop has reached over a billion downloads and is consistently ranked #1 in music games.[52]
Tổ tôm: the origin of tổ tôm is still unclear, but by the 19th century in Vietnam, this card game was very popular, especially among the upper class who considered it an elegant game that required a lot of intelligence.
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