Nobel Prize in Physics shared by CCD inventors, fiber optics pioneer
By Donald Melanson 
posted October 6th 2009 2:08PM
posted October 6th 2009 2:08PM
It's not every year that the Nobel Prize in Physics falls within our scope of coverage, but this year turned out to a big exception, as the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has deemed it fit to recognize two breakthroughs in the fiber optics and digital photography. The first of those (and half of the $1.4 million prize) goes to Charles K. Kao, whose work in the mid-60s getting light to travel long distances through glass strands made the fiber optic cables we have today possible. The second half of the prize is divided between Canadian Willard S. Boyle and American George E. Smith, who both worked at Bell Labs in Murray Hill, New Jersey, and invented the so-called charge-coupled device semiconductor, better known to anyone that has ever looked at a digital camera spec list as a CCD.
[Image courtesy Nobelprize.org]
[Image courtesy Nobelprize.org]
Without people like this, gadgets would be impossible. Watch your comment fade.
I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that not all Nobels are given based on the potential a particular type of research has, rather than the good it has actually done. And yes, considering the advancements in technology CCD and optical fiber has brought, they darn well deserve a nobel.
Hats off to the brilliant people who make our lives so much better!! HUZZAH!!
Nooglerstrike is right. What use are the fiber optic cables used in intercontinental connections anyway? What have CCDs done for anyone? Did they save your kitten from a tree? No? Useless, isn't it?
Sarcasm people. Make sure you keep you detectors well maintained.
thank the Nobel prize winners as my INTERNET net is using fiber optic FAST!!
That's got to be one of the most dumbest comments I've ever seen here.
why Charles K. Kao photo says: photo: richard epworth?
Never mind... this one is pretty stupid too.
You're right! I thought the National Inventor's Hall of Fame Foundation was a foundation of some sort, not an old man!
damn..htd...just...damn..
*facepalm*
fiber optic connection allows for quick connectivity for one part of the world to communicate the opposite side of the world and you can't imagine up a scenario where that can't benifit mankind especially in crisis situation? think about back in the day when war is fought without the internet and messages are being sent by letter mail, the message could be the war is over and here you are still fighting it out like there's no tomorrow.
as for ccd.. surgeons use that technology to take digital pictures of your body to find cancerous areas.
"What have CCDs done for anyone? Did they save your kitten from a tree? No? Useless, isn't it?"
Talk about fail logic. Should people be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for saving a kitten from a tree? LOL
"'CCD' refers to the way that the image signal is read out from the chip. Under the control of an external circuit, each capacitor can transfer its electric charge to one or another of its neighbors. CCDs are used in digital photography, digital photogrammetry, astronomy (particularly in photometry), sensors, electron microscopy, medical fluoroscopy, optical and UV spectroscopy, and high speed techniques such as lucky imaging."
"CCDs containing grids of pixels are used in digital cameras, optical scanners and video cameras as light-sensing devices. They commonly respond to 70% of the incident light (meaning a quantum efficiency of about 70%) making them far more efficient than photographic film, which captures only about 2% of the incident light.
Most common types of CCDs are sensitive to near-infrared light, which allows infrared photography, night-vision devices, and zero lux (or near zero lux) video-recording/photography. For normal silicon based detectors the sensitivity is limited to 1.1μm. One other consequence of their sensitivity to infrared is that infrared from remote controls will often appear on CCD-based digital cameras or camcorders if they don't have infrared blockers."
Useless?
@N900
you need to disable your sarcasm filter
I'm sorry. It's just that CCD is very helpful in medical photography, photography in general. And saying it's useless is just asinine.
@N900 We know. We realize (all of us). We appreciate it. Hence, the sarcasm. It's so blatant sarcasm actually, it just screams of our gratitude towards these people.
I know, I know.
K's comment and mine were replies to an idiot who posted first saying "What does this have to do with gadgets. first"
Breaking Bad?
That last guy looks like he is undressing me with his eyes.
Funny, I thought the same thing
/shudder
Why are those guys rewarded 50 years after ?
Because fundamental physic is running into a wall, for several years (decades ?) now so to keep this Nobel Prize a little interesting they are looking back to old discoveries. It sure didn t take 50 years for Marie Curie or Einstein to get it.
Also since theoretical physic is stalling they tend to shift the focus and reward applied physic.
Those guys are worthy of the Prize, but the question is would they have had it if they had to compete with guys
like Niels Bohr or W. Heisenberg ?
Or James Wright
My father (who passed away in July) worked at STL in Harlow, Essex (UK) with Kao (my father worked on different stuff like the plasma etcher though).
I now work for a CMOS imager company who are working hard on replacing CCDs.
Your father sure was lucky. Kao now has Alzheimer's disease and has forgotten about his work on fibre optics (but still loves his wife).
Here's a very recent picture of the Chinese legend: http://l.yimg.com/fe/p/news/singtao/20091008/15cq4na013oi5g-i0.jpg
why did it take so long for them to be awarded and why did they get the physics award when there are better finds in this decade
www.justin-is-great.mybrute.com can u beat me and my wolf?
There´s a pretty long line in front of "Collect your nobel prize here"-booth in Stockholm.
Good to see an optics topic winning the Nobel Prize! It makes my tedious graduate work slightly more encouraging. Not to mention that I use fiber optics daily in my research! Hats off to these chaps.
What are you working on? I'm doing pretty much the same thing.
Sorry for the late reply, I'm working on microresonators. You?
Are you attending the FIO conference tomorrow?
Test
Kids, stay in school.
Congratulations, gentlemen! Well deserved.
Is it just me or does the guy on the right look like Brian Cranston (Walter White from Breaking Bad)?
The real interesting question here is: Will having won the Nobel Prize in Physics help any of these three nerds get laid any more often?
Do chics dig Nobel winners?
Some women have do have strange fetishes for old men. e.g. Anna Nicole Smith (was it because of their wealth and potential inheritance?)
...they would have given it to Albert Einstein for his work that made CCD's and fibre-optic data possible...
...but he is dead...
...so this is the next best thing...
...i don't think he is bitter though...
...Old Albo and i happen to agree on this one...