Today in Technology History
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May 23
John Bardeen, an American physicist who played a central role in two significant technological advances of the last century, was born on May 23, 1908 in Wisconsin.
Bardeen studied physics and electrical engineering, and he worked as a physicist for the U.S. Navy during World War II.
His two claims to fame are related to conductors, so let's start with some background. Since 1729, scientists have known that electricity flows better through some materials than others. Materials that easily transmit electricity (such as metals) are called conductors; materials that do not readily transmit electricity (such as rubber) are insulators.
Bardeen's greatest discovery related to a class of substances between conductors and insulators, called semiconductors (such as silicon). Working at Bell Labs, Bardeen helped develop a device to control the electrical current passing through semiconductors. This device was the first transistor.
Transistors replaced the expensive, bulky and fragile vacuum tubes then in use, and the age of miniaturization began. The electronics industry owes its existence to Bardeen, especially today, when millions of transistors are crammed into every computer and mobile phone. For the invention of the transistor, Bardeen shared the 1956 Nobel Prize for physics with two colleagues.
Bardeen's second discovery involved superconductors -- materials which conduct electricity perfectly, with no resistance at all, when they reach extremely low temperatures. Someday, superconductors could revolutionize technology as much as transistors have done. Bardeen helped develop a theory to explain the superconductor phenomenon, for which he shared a second Nobel Prize in 1972. (No one else ever won the Nobel Prize for Physics twice.)
Bardeen died in 1991.
Related links:
Click here to read an excellent biography of Bardeen.
Click here to read the official Nobel biography of Bardeen.
Click here to read the Associated Press obituary for Bardeen, from 1991.
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