Bell Labs said Thursday two of its former researchers were awarded by the National Academy of Engineering for inventing the charge-coupled device.
William Boyle and George Smith received the NAE's Charles Stark Draper Prize for recognizing the impact CCD has had on society. Bell Labs is the research-and-development arm of Lucent Technologies.
CCD technology transforms patterns of light into useful digital information and is the basis for many forms of modern imaging. One of the most noticeable impacts the invention has now is its universal use in digital cameras, video cameras bar-code readers and image scanners such as copy machines. Both Boyle and Smith were members of the semiconductor-components division at Bell Labs and began their seminal work on the CCD in 1969.
The award will be presented Feb. 21 at a ceremony in Washington during National Engineers Week. Accompanying the recognition is an award of $500,000, which will be shared between Boyle and Smith.
Copyright 2006 by United Press International
