<P> A cotton gin is a machine that quickly and easily separates cotton fibers from their seeds, allowing for much greater productivity than manual cotton separation . The fibers are then processed into various cotton goods such as linens, while any undamaged cotton is used largely for textiles like clothing . Seeds may be used to grow more cotton or to produce cottonseed oil . </P> <P> Handheld roller gins had been used in India and then other countries since at earliest 500 CE . The Indian worm - gear roller gin, invented some time around the sixteenth century, has, according to Lakwete, remained virtually unchanged up to the present time . A modern mechanical cotton gin was created by American inventor Eli Whitney in 1793 and patented in 1794 . Whitney's gin used a combination of a wire screen and small wire hooks to pull the cotton through, while brushes continuously removed the loose cotton lint to prevent jams . It revolutionized the cotton industry in the United States, but also led to the growth of slavery in the American South as the demand for cotton workers rapidly increased . The invention has thus been identified as an inadvertent contributing factor to the outbreak of the American Civil War . Modern automated cotton gins use multiple powered cleaning cylinders and saws, and offer far higher productivity than their hand - powered forebears . </P> <P> Eli Whitney invented his cotton gin in 1793 . He began to work on this project after moving to Georgia in search of work . Given that farmers were desperately searching for a way to make cotton farming profitable, a woman named Catharine Greene provided Whitney with funding to create the first cotton gin . Whitney created two cotton gins: a small one that could be hand cranked and a large one that could be driven by a horse or water power . Thanks to the cotton gin, the amount of raw cotton yielded doubled each decade after 1800 . </P>

Who invented the cotton gin and what was its impact
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