Robert N. Hall
Robert N. Hall (born December 25, 1919) is an American engineer and applied physicist. He demonstrated the first semiconductor laser, and invented a type of magnetron commonly used in microwave ovens. He also contributed to the development of rectifiers for power transmission.
[edit] Biography
Hall was born in New Haven, Connecticut. He studied at California Institute of Technology, receiving the B.S. in 1942 and the Ph.D. in 1948.
Studying the characteristics of p-i-n diodes used as power rectifiers, he had a key insight which resulted in his being co-credited with William Shockley and W. T. Read, Jr., for the analysis of nonradiative carrier recombination in semiconductors.
Hall developed the semiconductor laser in 1962, while working at General Electric in Schenectady, New York.[1] In the 1970s, Hall's work focussed on photovoltaics and solar cells. He retired in 1987 having been granted 43 U.S. patents during his career.
Hall was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1977, and to the National Academy of Sciences in 1978. He was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1994.
[edit] References
- ^ Hall, Robert N.; G. E. Fenner, J. D. Kingsley, T. J. Soltys, and R. O. Carlson (November 1962). "Coherent Light Emission From GaAs Junctions". Physical Review Letters 9 (9): 366–369. Bibcode 1962PhRvL...9..366H. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.9.366.
[edit] Further reading
- Hall, Robert N., "Early transistor history at GE", 2000, http://www.semiconductormuseum.com/Transistors/GE/OralHistories/Hall/Hall_Index.htm, accessed March 6, 2006.
- Invent Now Hall of Fame, "Robert N. Hall", http://www.invent.org/hall_of_fame/73.html, accessed March 6, 2006.
- Lemelson-MIT Program, "R. N. Hall", http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/hall3.html, accessed March 6, 2006.
- Hall, Robert N., "Laser 50th Anniversary: Robert N. Hall recalls the diode laser", 2010, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B1P9ERCaxg
