1999 Winners: Charles K. Kao, Robert D. Maurer, and John B. MacChesney
For development of fiber-optic technology.
Biographies
Charles K. Kao was born in 1933 in Shanghai, China. He received his bachelors degree in 1957 and a doctorate in 1965, both in electrical engineering from the University of London. He joined ITT in 1957 as an engineer and in 1974 he joined the electro-optical products division in Roanoke, Va., as chief scientist and later became director of engineering. In 1982, in recognition of his outstanding research and management abilities, ITT named him the first ITT executive scientist.
From 1987 until 1996, Kao served as vice chancellor (president) of The Chinese University of Hong Kong. In 1995 he received the prestigious IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal. Kao was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering in 1990.
Robert D. Maurer was born in 1924 and is a native of Arkadelphia, Ark. He received a bachelor degree in physics in 1948 from the University of Arkansas and a doctorate, also in physics, from MIT in 1951. In 1943 he enlisted in the United States Army Reserve and began studies at the University of Arkansas. He was quickly called up for active service, and studied pre-engineering for one year at the Huntsville, Texas, state college. He returned to the university pursuing physics.
Following a post-graduate year at MIT, Maurer joined the physics department of Corning's research and development laboratory, progressing from research physicist in 1952 through senior research associate and manager of the fundamental physics department to research fellow in 1978. In 1966 Maurer learned of Charles Kao’s pioneering work in optical fibers and initiated a project to develop such fibers at Corning. He retired from Corning in 1989.
Maurer is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the National Inventors Hall of Fame and a fellow of the American Ceramic Society, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, and American Physical Society. He has received numerous honors for his accomplishments, including the American Institute of Physics's 1978 Prize for Industrial Physics and the 1979 IEEE Morris N. Liebmann Memorial Award.
John B. MacChesney was born in New Jersey in 1929. He earned a B.A. degree in chemistry from Bowdoin College in 1951. He served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War, and he subsequently studied at City College of New York and New York University while working in New York City. He matriculated at the Pennsylvania State University, from which he graduated with a Ph.D. in geochemistry in 1959.
At that time he joined Bell Laboratories, where he has continued his employment to the present, through the transition from AT&T to Lucent Technologies, and now has the rank of fellow.
It was in 1974 that MacChesney and his colleagues at Bell Laboratories provided a detailed description of a commercially viable process, Modified Chemical Vapor Deposition (MCVD), for mass-producing high quality optical fiber. MacChesney remains engaged in the development of glass and its processing to economically produce next generation optical devices. He was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering in 1985 and has received many other honors and awards, including the IEEE Morris N. Liebmann Award.
Fiber Optics
Fiber-optic cables are transparent fibers, usually made of silicon, that can contain and guide a beam of light. Modern optical fibers are extremely efficient; unlike the electrons in wires, light can travel a long distance through an optical fiber without losing noticeable amounts of energy. Because of this, fiber-optic cables are excellent for transmitting information – they can hold more data, for a much greater distance, than similarly-sized wires. In addition, optical fibers’ ability to guide light with minimal loss makes them perfect for applications where light needs to be sent into an enclosed space – such as in medicine.
Although basic principles for guiding light have been known since the 1840s, optical fibers efficient enough for data transmission did not exist until the 1970s, when breakthroughs by Charles Kao, Robert Maurer, and John MacChesney made them possible.
