Dwight Isbell was a radio engineer,

IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operation ...

antennas and propagation fellow, and co-inventor of the Log-periodic antenna while a student at the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the University ...

under Raymond DuHamel. The log periodic antenna made possible broadband reception of color television signals. He is notable for the invention of antenna, and the resulting lawsuits regarding the antenna.Supreme Court Record
"BLONDER TONGUE V. UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS FOUND., 402 U. S. 313"

US Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point of ...

, 1971. Retrieved on May 6th, 2010. The invention of the antenna and the patents were widely ignored by

Channel Master Channel Master is a manufacturer of TV Antennas and Accessories. History The original company, now defunct, was founded in Ellenville, New York, in 1949 by 23 year-old former Merchant Marine radio operator and DuMont TV antenna installer ...

and

Blonder-Tongue Blonder Tongue Laboratories Inc. is a global communication equipment supplier for TV broadcasters, cable system operators, lodging video, internet systems and institutional systems. As a cable television pioneer founded in 1950, the company has s ...

, and resulted in the precedent setting Blonder-Tongue doctrine of " judicial economy", which bars defendants of patents from that have been previously ruled invalid (changing the Triplett v. Lowe precedent).

References

1929 births 2011 deaths American engineers American inventors People from Seattle {{academic-bio-stub