[Leica] This year's Nobel Prize awarded to "inventor of digital imaging" - the first CCD

[vick.ko at sympatico.ca (Vick Ko)]

This year's Nobel Prize awarded to "inventor of digital imaging"

STOCKHOLM ? A Canadian man has been awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in physics.

Willard Boyle, 85, a Canadian from Halifax, and George Smith of the 
United States shared one half of the prize for inventing the first 
successful imaging technology using a digital sensor.
...
a breakthrough by Boyle and Smith in 1969, when they invented the first 
successful imaging technology using a digital sensor, or charge-coupled 
device.


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STOCKHOLM ? A Canadian man has been awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in physics.

Willard Boyle, 85, a Canadian from Halifax, and George Smith of the 
United States shared one half of the prize for inventing the first 
successful imaging technology using a digital sensor.

Charles Kao, a Shanghai-born British-American, also won half the prize 
for research that led to a breakthrough in fibre-optics, determining how 
to transmit light over long distances via optical glass fibres.

"This year's Nobel Prize in physics is awarded for two scientific 
achievements that have helped to shape the foundations of today's 
networked societies," the award-winning committee said in a statement 
Tuesday.

"They have created many practical innovations for everyday life and 
provided new tools for scientific exploration."

Kao's work formed the basis for the production of the first "ultrapure" 
fibre only four years later, setting the stage for the communication 
society of today.

"These low-gloss glass fibres facilitate global broadband communication 
such as the Internet," the committee said.

"Text, music, images and video can be transferred around in the globe in 
a split second."

A large portion of the traffic is made up of digital images, facilitated 
by a breakthrough by Boyle and Smith in 1969, when they invented the 
first successful imaging technology using a digital sensor, or 
charge-coupled device.

"It revolutionized photography, as light can be captured electronically 
instead of on film," the committee said.

The prize of 10 million Swedish crowns ($1.4 million U.S.), awarded by 
the Nobel Committee for Physics at the Royal Swedish Academy of 
Sciences, was the second of this year's Nobel prizes.