Dekatron
![An octal-base dekatron.](/Images/godic/202501/08/Dekatron1733.jpg")
![Detail of the top of a dekatron — central anode disk surrounded by 30 internal cathode pins.](/Images/godic/202501/08/Dekatron_top1733.jpg")
![Sending sequenced pulses to guide electrodes will determine the direction of movement.](/Images/godic/202501/08/Dekatron_operation_neg1733.png")
In electronics, a Dekatron (or Decatron, or generically three-phase gas counting tube or glow-transfer counting tube or cold cathode tube) is a gas-filled decade counting tube. Dekatrons were used in computers, calculators and other counting-related products during the 1950s and 1960s. "Dekatron," now a generic trademark, was the brand name used by the British Ericsson Telephones Limited (ETL), of Beeston, Nottingham (not to be confused with the Swedish TelefonAB Ericsson of Stockholm).