Herbert Kroemer

Infobox Scientist
name = Herb Kroemer

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imagesize = 180px
caption = Herbert Kroemer
birth_date = birth date and age|1928|8|25
birth_place = Weimar, Germany
residence = United States
nationality = Germany United States
fields = Electronic engineer
workplaces = nowrap|Fernmeldetechnisches Zentralamt
RCA Laboratories
Varian Associates
University of Colorado
University of California, Santa Barbara
alma_mater = University of Jena
University of Gottingen
doctoral_advisor = Fritz Sauter
academic_advisors =
doctoral_students = William Frensley
notable_students =
known_for = Drift-field transistor
Double-heterostructure laser
influences = Friedrich Hund
Fritz Houtermans
awards = Nobel Prize in Physics (2000)

Herbert Kroemer (born August 25, 1928), a professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara, received his Ph.D. in theoretical physics in 1952 from the University of Gottingen, Germany, with a dissertation on hot electron effects in the then-new transistor, setting the stage for a career in research on the physics of semiconductor devices. In 2000, Dr. Kroemer, along with Zhores I. Alferov, was awarded a Nobel Prize in Physics "for developing semiconductor heterostructures used in high-speed- and opto-electronics".

He worked in a number of research laboratories in Germany and the United States and taught electrical engineering at the University of Colorado from 1968 to 1976. He joined the UCSB faculty in 1976, focusing its semiconductor research program on the emerging compound semiconductor technology rather than on mainstream silicon technology.

Kroemer, a member of the National Academy of Engineering, has always preferred to work on problems that are ahead of mainstream technology. In the 1950s, he invented the drift transistor and was the first to point out that advantages could be gained in various semiconductor devices by incorporating heterojunctions into the devices. Most notably, in 1963 he proposed the concept of the double-heterostructure laser, the central concept in the field of semiconductor lasers. Kroemer became an early pioneer in molecular beam epitaxy, concentrating on applying the technology to untried new materials.

Along with Charles Kittel he co-authored the popular textbook "Thermal Physics", first published in 1980, and still used today.

External links

* [http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/careers/careerstemplate.jsp?ArticleId=p060302 Not Just Blue Sky]
* [http://nobelprize.org/physics/laureates/2000/index.html Nobelprize.org page]
* [http://www.ece.ucsb.edu/Faculty/Kroemer/default.html Personal Homepage USCB]
* [http://www.vega.org.uk/video/programme/32 Freeview video Interview with Herbert Kroemer by the Vega Science Trust]
* [http://www.patentgenius.com/patent/5067828.html U.S. Patent 5067828] Transferred electron effective mass modulator (Herbert Kroemer)
* [http://www.patentgenius.com/patent/5013683.html U.S. Patent 5013683] Method for growing tilted superlattices (Herbert Kroemer)
* [http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/16/20748/00960370.pdf "Herb’s Bipolar Transistors" IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRON DEVICES, VOL. 48, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2001] PDF
* [http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/16/31630/01474625.pdf?isnumber=&arnumber=1474625 Influence of Mobility and Lifetime Variations on Drift-Field Effects in Silicon-Junction Devices] PDF
* [http://www.ece.ucsb.edu/faculty/Kroemer/pubs/6_82HBTsICs.pdf Heterostructure Bipolar Transistors and Integrated Circuits] PDF