Jan Aleksander Rajchman (

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, 10 August 1911 – 1 April 1989) was a Polish electrical engineer and

computer pioneer This is a list of people who made transformative breakthroughs in the creation, development and imagining of what computers could do. Pioneers : ''To arrange the list by date or person (ascending or descending), click that column's small "up-do ...

Biography

Jan Aleksander was son of Ludwik Rajchman and Maria Bojańczyk. His father was a Polish

bacteriologist A bacteriologist is a microbiologist, or similarly trained professional, in bacteriology -- a subdivision of microbiology that studies bacteria, typically pathogenic ones. Bacteriologists are interested in studying and learning about bacteria, ...

and the founder of

UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to ...

. He was born in London, where his parents temporarily lived, and where his father held various positions at the Royal Institute of Public Health and King's College. He received the Diploma of Electrical Engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich in 1935, and became a

Doctor of Science Doctor of Science ( la, links=no, Scientiae Doctor), usually abbreviated Sc.D., D.Sc., S.D., or D.S., is an academic research degree awarded in a number of countries throughout the world. In some countries, "Doctor of Science" is the degree used f ...

in 1938. Rajchman emigrated to America in 1935. He joined

RCA The RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded as the Radio Corporation of America in 1919. It was initially a patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse, AT&T Corporation and United Fruit Comp ...

Laboratory directed by Vladimir K. Zworykin in January 1936. He was a prolific inventor with 107 US patents among others logic circuits for arithmetic. He conceived the first

read-only memory Read-only memory (ROM) is a type of non-volatile memory used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be electronically modified after the manufacture of the memory device. Read-only memory is useful for storing sof ...

, which was widely used in early computers. He conceived and developed the selectively addressable storage tube, the ill-fated

Selectron tube The Selectron was an early form of digital computer memory developed by Jan A. Rajchman and his group at the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) under the direction of Vladimir K. Zworykin. It was a vacuum tube that stored digital data as elect ...

, and the

core memory Core or cores may refer to: Science and technology * Core (anatomy), everything except the appendages * Core (manufacturing), used in casting and molding * Core (optical fiber), the signal-carrying portion of an optical fiber * Core, the centra ...

. He was a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), and a member of the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of ...

. He is also a member of

Sigma Xi Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Honor Society () is a highly prestigious, non-profit honor society for scientists and engineers. Sigma Xi was founded at Cornell University by a junior faculty member and a small group of graduate students in 1886 ...

, the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), the Physical Society, the

New York Academy of Sciences The New York Academy of Sciences (originally the Lyceum of Natural History) was founded in January 1817 as the Lyceum of Natural History. It is the fourth oldest scientific society in the United States. An independent, nonprofit organization wi ...

, and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the

Franklin Institute The Franklin Institute is a science museum and the center of science education and research in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is named after the American scientist and statesman Benjamin Franklin. It houses the Benjamin Franklin National Memori ...

. He received the 1960

IEEE Morris N. Liebmann Memorial Award The initially called Morris Liebmann Memorial Prize provided by the Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE), the IEEE Morris N. Liebmann Memorial Award was created in 1919 in honor of Colonel Morris N. Liebmann. It was initially given to awardees who h ...

and the 1974 IEEE

Edison Medal The IEEE Edison Medal is presented by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) "for a career of meritorious achievement in electrical science, electrical engineering, or the electrical arts." It is the oldest medal in this fi ...

''For a creative career in the development of electronic devices and for pioneering work in computer memory systems.''

US patents

* Magnetic System, 1957

Sources

IEEE History SiteSmithsonian Oral History, Interview with RajchmanMemorial TributeScientist of the Day - Jan Rajchman - Linda Hall Library
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rajchman 1911 births 1989 deaths American electrical engineers Polish emigrants to the United States American people of Polish-Jewish descent Fellow Members of the IEEE IEEE Edison Medal recipients Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Fellows of the American Physical Society 20th-century American engineers