24 May
2024
24 May
'24
4:52 p.m.
On May 24, 2024, at 12:45 PM, Chuck Guzis via cctalk
<cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> wrote:
...
Just pointing out that "firsts" are very difficult. Even though, for
years, Shockley et al were trumpeted as the "inventors of the
transistor", it's noteworthy that their patent application was carefully
worded to avoid claims from work decades earlier by Julius Lilienfeld.
In an interesting twist of history, it's the Lilienfeld model of a MOS
transistor that prevails in our current technology, not the Shockley
junction device.
I once ran into a pre-WW2 data sheet (or ad?) for a transistor, indeed an FET that used
selenium as the semiconducting material. Most likely that was the Lilienfeld device.
Apparently they didn't work well, not surprising given the use of selenium, which is a
very marginal semiconductor. Speaking of which: some early computers tried to use
selenium diodes as circuit elements (for gates), with rather limited success. The MC ARRA
is an example.
paul