10/30/2013, 2013 William Shockley Outline I. Introduction A. William Shockley B.

Thesis: William Shockley made an impact on technology by inventing the transistor. II. Life A. Born 1910 B. Career 1. Bell Laboratories 1936 2. Shockley Transistor Corporation III. The Transistor/ Semiconductor A. Who developed it 1. William Shockley 2. John Bardeen 3. Walter Brattain B. How It works 1. semiconductors IV. Influence A. Development of other Technologies 1. Replaced vacuum tubes in computers B. Nobel Prize 1. 1956 for Physics

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There have been many inventions and technological advances that have changed the world. The transistor was one of those inventions. It was invented by the scientists, Walter Brattain, John Bardeen, and William Shockley. William Shockley was an important part of that team and he later went on to improve transistor production. The transistor has had a major effect on modern technology and it has made many technological innovations possible especially in computer technology. By inventing the transistor William Shockley has had an effect on technology. William Shockley was born in London in 1910 to American parents. His family moved back to America and Shockley spent his childhood in Palo Alto, California. William Shockley went to the California Institute of Technology in 1928 and graduated with a physics major. Shockley then attended MIT to earn his Ph. D. Shockley then started his career at Bell Laboratories. During World War Two Shockley was part of a lab that examined nuclear fission as an energy source to develop the atomic bomb. After the war Shockley returned to Bell Laboritories. There, Shockley became the administrative leader of a team comprised of himself, John Bardeen, and Walter Brattain. It was at this time that they invented the transistor. From this Shockley developed a better transistor that was easier to mass produce, this development lead to Shockley becoming the spokesperson for
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their invention. Shockley left Bell Labs and started the Shockley Transistor Corporation, where he mass produced transistors. The transistor is a component of modern day computers. In 1947 Walter Brattain, John Bardeen, and William Shockley finished inventing the transistor. They invented the transistor because they were trying to find a good substitute for vacuum tubes. Vacuum tubes were computer parts that were used to complete circuits in the computer. They were bulky and unreliable. This made the computers they were in very large and not very practical. The transistor controls the electricity flow through the circuit board in a computer. Transistors are made using semiconductors. Which are materials that insulate and conduct electricity. By combining semiconductors diodes can be made. Diodes are devices that only allow electricity to flow one way. A combination of diodes is what a transistor is made of. The transistor is one most important invention in technology. The invention of the transistor has allowed for many technological inventions. Before the transistor computers had vacuum tubes in them. This caused computers to be large bulky, because of this computers were not available to a lot of people. When the transistor was invented it replaced vacuum tubes and computers could

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become much smaller. Computers became smaller and more capable of using energy. William Shockleys company was able to mass produce transistors making computers available to more people. The transistor was able to provide so many technological advances, not only to computers but other devices as well. This included radios and later cellphones. All of these devices have transistors in them. Through many improvements to the transistor we now have modern computers and electronic devices.

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Sources "William B. Shockley - Biographical". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2013. Web. 28 Oct 2013. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1956/shockleybio.html William Shockley PBS.org Copyright 1999, ScienCentral, Inc, and The American Institute of Physics. http://www.pbs.org/transistor/album1/shockley/ Chandler, Nathan. "How Transistors Work" 01 January 2001. HowStuffWorks.com. http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/transistor.htm 30 October 2013.

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