CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Nick Holonyak Jr. is called the godfather of the light-emitting diode. His scientific career, spanning more than 50 years, has changed the world and is the subject of a program to premiere on the Big Ten Network July 28 at 7 a.m. (CDT).
Nick Holonyak Jr.'s innovations are noted on one of the campus historical markers. | Photo by L. Brian Stauffer
People interact with Holonyak’s inventions every day. The technology in visible LEDs, household dimmer switches, lasers that run CD and DVD players and fiber-optic communication networks can all be traced back to his laboratory at the University of Illinois.
Holonyak’s story is the American Dream. The son of an immigrant coal miner in Southern Illinois, Holonyak was born in 1928. He left backbreaking work on the Illinois Central Railroad to become the first in his family to seek higher education.
Holonyak, the John Bardeen Chair in Electrical and Computer Engineering and Physics at Illinois, is still inventing and researching. His most recent invention, the transistor laser, is the first device to simultaneously transmit electrical current and light.
Alison Davis Wood and Tim Hartin, producers of U. of I. documentaries for the Big Ten Network, tell Holonyak’s story, from the coal mines to international acclaim, through the eyes of the innovators to whom Holonyak has been a colleague and mentor.
“A Brilliant Idea: Nick Holonyak and the LED” will be rebroadcast July 29 at 3 a.m.
