Dr. Paul K. Weimer (November 5, 1914 – January 6, 2005) was a noted contributor to the development of

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

and the

thin-film transistor A thin-film transistor (TFT) is a special type of field-effect transistor (FET) where the transistor is thin relative to the plane of the device. TFTs are grown on a supporting (but non-conducting) substrate. A common substrate is glass, becaus ...

(TFT). Weimer was born in

Wabash, Indiana Wabash is a city in Noble Township, Wabash County, in the U.S. state of Indiana. The population was 10,666 at the 2010 census. The city is the county seat of Wabash County. Wabash is notable as claiming to be the first electrically lighted cit ...

. He received a B.A. in math and physics from

Manchester University (Indiana) Manchester University (formerly Manchester College) is a private liberal arts university associated with the Church of the Brethren and two locations, a residential campus in North Manchester, Indiana, and a second location in Fort Wayne, Indiana ...

in 1936, an M.A. in physics from the

University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, and several satellite campuses, research and educational centers, medical centers, and classes across the state of Kansas. Tw ...

in 1938, and a Ph.D. in physics from

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...

in 1942. He then joined the

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 in

Princeton, New Jersey Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of whi ...

, where he worked until retirement in 1981. His first assignment was to develop an electron multiplier to go with the Image Orthicon. This tube, which proved to be 100 times more sensitive than its predecessors, was used for the first 20 years of television broadcasting in the United States. In 1961, Weimer began making thin-film transistors in a coplanar process on

glass Glass is a non-crystalline, often transparent, amorphous solid that has widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in, for example, window panes, tableware, and optics. Glass is most often formed by rapid cooling (quenching) of ...

substrates. In a typical process, he would deposit a gold source and drain, then deposit polycrystalline semiconductor material, and place a gate on top. After he placed an insulator between the gate and semiconductor, he got excellent results, as published in his 1962 paper, "The TFT: A New Thin-Film Transistor", in the ''

Proceedings of the IRE The ''Proceedings of the IEEE'' is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). The journal focuses on electrical engineering and computer science. According to the ''Journa ...

''. Weimer held over 90 patents, and was 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 ...

and fellow of the

Institute for Radio Engineers The Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE) was a professional organization which existed from 1912 until December 31, 1962. On January 1, 1963, it merged with the American Institute of Electrical Engineers (AIEE) to form the Institute of Electrical a ...

. He received the IRE Television Prize, the 1966

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 ...

, an individual RCA David Sarnoff Outstanding Achievement Award in Science, and the 1986 Kultur Preis of the German Photographic Society. He died in

, at age 90.

References

External links

''New York Times'' obituary, January 12, 2005

IEEE oral history

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weimer, Paul K. 1914 births 2005 deaths American electrical engineers Manchester University (Indiana) alumni Ohio State University Graduate School alumni University of Kansas alumni 20th-century American engineers

See also

References

External links