Donald Keck

Donald B. Keck
Born	2 January 1941(1941-01-02) Lansing, Michigan
Nationality	United States
Fields	Physics, Optical Physics Fiber, Fiber Sensors, Guided Wave Devices
Alma mater	Michigan State University
Known for	Optical Fiber
Notable awards	National Medal of Technology (2000)

Dr. Donald B. Keck (b. January 2, 1941) is an American research physicist and engineer most noted for his involvement in developing low-loss optical fiber. Keck grew up in Lansing, Michigan and attended Michigan State University, after which he joined Corning Incorporated’s research department. As a senior research scientist for Corning, Dr. Keck, along with Robert D. Maurer and Peter C. Schultz, designed the first optical fiber with optical losses low enough for wide use in telecommunications, effectively launching the modern fiber optics industry.

Keck spent the entirety of his professional career at Corning, where he eventually held the position of Vice President and Technology Director of Optical Physics, during which time he guided the company into the field of photonics. For his work with optical fiber, he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1993, and received the prestigious National Medal of Technology in 2000.

Early life

Donald B. Keck was born on January 2, 1941 in Lansing, Michigan, where he also spent all of his youth. An active and curious child, he participated in the Boy Scouts program throughout his early years. Keck’s father, an educated physicist, had great influence over him, encouraging and inspiring his son to engage in scientific pursuits. During his childhood, Keck was surrounded by his father’s prisms and lenses at home, spawning his interest in the science of light – his specialty throughout his professional career – at a very young age.

Education

Keck remained in his hometown for college, entering Michigan State University in 1958 with the intention of becoming an electrical engineer. However, during his undergraduate years, he was persuaded by his father to switch disciplines and study physics. As a result, he received his B.S. in Physics in 1962 and his M.S. in Physics in 1964, both from Michigan State. He encountered optical fiber for the first time during his second year as a graduate student, and was immediately fascinated. He subsequently continued his studies, writing his doctorate thesis on infrared spectroscopy, and ultimately received his Ph.D. in Physics from Michigan State in 1967. Keck’s time spent at Michigan State was the foundation for his later success, providing him not only with a quality education, but also exposing him to the field of study in which he would later excel. Regarding his doctorate work, Keck said, “The particular thesis work I did revolved around infrared spectroscopy. I learned I like optics. I learned about materials and their different spectral responses. I was ready to hit the ground running at Corning.”

Corning years

After receiving his Ph.D., Keck began looking for a job. The market was booming for physicists in 1967, as both the space exploration and weapons development industries were thriving. Keck received numerous job offers, and had no intention of working for Corning until a recruiter visited the Michigan State campus and displayed a bundle of optical fiber. Intrigued by the fiber, Keck visited Corning Incorporated in Corning, New York, and met with Dr. Robert Maurer, who discussed Corning’s optical fiber development project and its goal of building a low-loss optical waveguide suitable for transmitting data. After listening to Maurer, Keck accepted an offer from Corning, moved to New York, and began work as a senior research scientist on the project in January 1968.

Optical fiber

In the early 1960s, demand emerged for a new telephone wire technology. Copper cables, which were the state-of-the-art at the time, were being pushed to their limit, as more and more telephone calls were being made. An international effort began to find the next great data transmission technology.

Initially, optical fibers – glass or plastic fibers which carry data in the form of light – were of little consideration for the job of replacing copper wires. The fibers that existed in the 1960s were high-loss; while they directed the light, they also absorbed so much of it that little of its signal remained after a few meters, rendering them useless for long-distance telecommunications. However, Robert Maurer, Keck’s boss, believed low-loss optical fiber could be produced, and made its invention his goal. Maurer’s goal was to invent a fiber with a loss, or attenuation, of 20 decibels per kilometer (db/km). At the time of Keck’s hiring, the best optical fibers had attenuations of 200 to 1000 db/km.

Corning’s Optical WaveGuide Project team, composed of Maurer, also a physicist, Keck, and Peter C. Schultz, a chemist, approached the task differently than other researchers. Instead of trying to improve upon existing fibers by using better raw materials, Maurer sought to explore the capabilities of new materials, including pure silica. The team devised a division of labor, where Maurer focused on physics, Schultz developed new types of glass, and Keck turned this glass into fiber.

They started work on the project as soon as Keck arrived at the beginning of 1968, and had little early success. They experimented with different glass compositions and methods of heating the glass. Finally, in August 1970, the team found their breakthrough moment: late one afternoon, after both Maurer and Schultz had left for the day, Keck took measurements of the newest batch of fibers he had heat-treated. When Keck noticed the light passed through the 65 foot fiber seemingly without any loss, he exclaimed “Good grief, what do I have here?” Keck took more measurements of the fiber, and discovered it had an attenuation of 16 db/km, exceeding the goal of 20 db/km. Upon this discovery, Keck wrote in his laboratory notebook, “Attenuation equals 16 db it says. Eureka,” followed by an exclamatory “Whoopee!”. Keck and his team had invented the first low-loss optical fiber; it was composed of heat-treated titanium-doped silica. Papers were written and patents were filed, and Corning introduced the fiber to the outside world, but it would take another 10 years before the telecommunications industry began utilizing their invention.

In the meantime, Keck continued to improve upon the fiber he had invented. He replaced the titanium oxide glass of 1970 with germanium oxide doped glass, and eventually achieved a consistent 4 db/km attenuation in June 1972. By the end of the 1970s, Keck had four critical inventions which secured Corning’s place as frontrunner in the optical fiber revolution: fused silica doped with titanium; fused silica doped with germanium; the inside vapor deposition, or IV process, for making fiber; and the outside vapor deposition, or OV process, for making fiber, which would ultimately become the leading manufacturing method.

By 1979, Corning was mass producing the refined optical fiber invented by Keck in Wilmington, North Carolina. In the early 1980s, the telecom company MCI placed an order with Corning for 100,000 km of fiber a year, in effect signaling that the telecommunications industry had finally realized the revolutionary potential of Keck’s invention. Today, more than 90% of long-distance data in the United States is now sent through the optical fiber Keck and his team designed and produced. Optical fibers, which can now carry 65,000 times more information than the copper wires they replaced, ultimately allowed for the development of the Internet in the early 1990s.

Later work

After his initial success with low-loss optical fiber, Keck continued working with Corning to make optical communications more viable. Keck was responsible for inventing numerous optical couplers and splitters, which greatly extended the applications of optical fiber. He was elected Editor-in-Chief of the industry-leading Journal of Lightwave Technology in 1989, a position he held until 1994.

Moreover, Keck began to rise within the corporate ladder at Corning. After beginning as a senior research scientist in 1968, almost 30 years later, in April 1997, Corning appointed Keck the Division Vice President of Core Technology, Optics and Photonics – Science and Technology. During his management tenure, Keck was a key figure in establishing Corning’s modern innovation ethos, and also helped guide Corning into the emerging field of photonics. By the end of his tenure with Corning, Keck was well regarded in the scientific community as an expert within the fields of molecular spectroscopy, gradient and aspheric optics, guided-wave optics, fiber optic sensors and optical fibers, and research management.

After Corning

Keck retired from Corning in 2002, after spending 34 years with the company. Throughout his career, he served the company in numerous capacities, and at the time of his retirement he held the position of Vice President and Director of Research. Immediately after his retirement, Keck helped establish the Infotonics Technology Center in Canandaigua (town), New York, a collaborative organization between private industry and government focused on photonics and nanotechnology innovation. Due to his expertise in both photonics and research management, he was elected the first Chief Technology Officer of Infotonics, a position he held briefly.

Dr. Keck and his wife, Ruth Keck, currently reside in Big Flats, New York, outside of Corning, New York. He has two adult children, both of whom are also involved in technological fields: Lynne Vaia, a civil engineer, and Brian Keck, a software expert. He is involved in local philanthropy in Corning, holding board membership for the American Red Cross, the Community Foundation, and the Science Center. In addition to still consulting for Infotonics, Keck remains active in the science community, serving on the oversight board for the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the IPO Education Foundation Board of Directors, as well as holding the position of Vice-Chair of the National Inventors Hall of Fame Board of Directors. Furthermore, Keck is a benefactor of his alma mater, Michigan State University, where he also currently sits on the Advisory Board for the university’s College of Natural Science, of which he was a graduate.

Awards and honors

For his many contributions to the science of light, Dr. Keck has received numerous accolades. His alma mater, Michigan State University, named him a Distinguished Alumnus, and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute granted him an honorary degree in 2004. For his discovery of low-loss optical fiber in particular, Keck was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1993, after which he served as President of the National Inventors Hall of Fame Foundation. He is also a recipient of the Department of Commerce American Innovator Award and the SPIE Technology Achievement Award. For his work with photonics, Keck was honored with Laurin Publishing’s Distinction in Photonics Award in 2002.

In 2000, U.S. President Bill Clinton awarded Keck, along with his fellow Corning researchers Robert Maurer and Peter Schultz, the nation’s highest honor for innovators, the National Medal of Technology, which recognizes those who make lasting contributions to enhancing America’s competitiveness and standard of living. Their award citation read: “Their invention has enabled the telecommunications revolution, rapidly transformed our society, the way we work, learn and live – and our expectations for the future. It is the basis for one of the largest, most dynamic industries in the world today.”15

Professional membership

Keck is a member of many professional organizations, including the National Academy of Engineering, the Optical Society of America, the Optoelectronics Industry Development Association, and the IEEE.

Patents

Throughout his career at Corning, Dr. Keck acquired 36 U.S. patents and authored more than 150 papers in the areas of optical fibers and fiber components. Selected patents are listed below:

• U.S. Patent 3,659,915 (1972-05) Maurer, et al., “Fused Silica Optical Waveguide.”
• U.S. Patent 3,711,262 (1973-01) Keck, et al., “IV Method of producing optical waveguide fibers.”

See also

• Corning Incorporated
• Robert D. Maurer
• Peter C. Schultz
• Optical Fiber

External links

• Appendix A: A Professional Experience Of Panel Members Brief biography of Keck.
• A Career Filled with Light: Don Keck Retires
• Inventor of the Week: Archive
• National Inventors Hall of Fame Biography
• Celebrating 25 Years of the IEEE/OSA

Persondata
Name	Keck, Donald
Alternative names
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Date of birth	January 2, 1941
Place of birth	Lansing, Michigan
Date of death
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