Nick Holonyak, Jr

Hailed as the "father of semiconductor light emitter technology in the western world," Nick Holonyak, Jr. is commonly credited with inventing the light-emitting diode (LED) and the first semiconductor laser to operate in the visible spectrum. Light sources based on his work dominate the optical communications and home entertainment industries.

The John Bardeen Chair and professor at the Center for Advanced Study at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Dr. Holonyak was Bardeen's first graduate student and enjoyed a 40-year friendship and collaboration with him. Since 1963, Dr. Holonyak and his students have made seminal contributions to quantum well lasers. Virtually all semiconductor lasers today use quantum wells for fiber-optic communications, compact disk and digital video disk players, medical diagnosis, surgery, ophthalmology and many other applications.

In the early 1980s, Dr. Holonyak's group introduced impurity-induced layer disordering, which converts layers of a semiconductor structure into alloy electrical properties. The discovery of this alloy solved the low-reliability issues previously plaguing lasers. With this technology, lasers exhibit higher performance and durability, making them ideal for DVD players and other optical storage equipment.

Dr. Holonyak began his distinguished career at Bell Telephone Laboratories in Murray Hill, N.J., in 1954, where he helped develop silicon-diffused transistor technology. He joined General Electric's Advanced Semiconductor Lab in 1957, where he developed thyristors, the basic electronic elements in household light-dimmer switches, and the first visible semiconductor laser and visible LED.

Dr. Holonyak holds four patents and has published numerous papers. A Life Fellow of the IEEE and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Optical Society of America, he also is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences. His honors include the IEEE Jack A. Morton Award, the IEEE Edison Medal, the U.S. National Medal of Science, the Charles Hard Townes Award of the Optical Society of America, the National Academy of Sciences Award for the Industrial Application of Science, the American Society for Engineering Education Centennial Medal and the Japan Prize.