280:
above the gun. Horizontal scanning is much faster than vertical, so this change greatly reduced the complexity of the driver electronics. At the top of the screen was a single wire charged to very high voltages, which bent the beam through 180 degrees back towards the bottom of the display. The vertical deflection plates were mounted on a plate arranged to lie between the path of the beam as it traveled upwards at the back of the tube and back down at the front.
117:. He thought the display tubes in use at the time were too long, and a shorter tube would be much more practical. Aiken was not the first to consider the possibility of a compact CRT with a thin display screen, but no-one had been successful in developing one at that point. There were any number of problems, especially with focusing arrangements, but Aiken kept attacking them one by one until he developed what he felt was a workable solution.
255:
arranged to the side of the screen, either firing horizontally across the top of the display tube, or firing vertically towards the top and then bent through 90 degrees to travel along the top. Across the top of the tube were a series of C-shaped plates and a matching set of parallel bars below it.
156:
Aiken then approached some of his old contacts at Kaiser, and they proved much more interested and happy to sign the non-disclosure agreement. After seeing the unit and how it worked they decided to fund development using profits from another division. When they discovered that the profits were due
279:
The second design, described in U.S. Patent 2,837,691, was similar to the first for vertical addressing, but used a conventional horizontal scanning system. The gun was moved to the lower middle of the display, firing upward, scanned horizontally by a single pair of deflection plates arranged just
259:
Behind the tube was a series of wide metal plates running horizontally along the back face of the display. These were used to bend the beam through an angle and cause it to hit the front face of the screen. 2D scanning was accomplished by charging two of the horizontal plates to select a vertical
260:
location on the display, and then quickly charging the deflection plates at the top in turn to select a horizontal location. Each vertical and horizontal plate addressed many locations on the screen, with the locations within each plate's area selected by charging it relative to its neighbors.
232:
arranged under the display area rather than to the side. Aiken had also filed similar patents after his early attempts. A patent battle followed, with Gabor eventually winning UK rights and Aiken U.S. rights. By this point active development of both had ended, and the two became friends.
207:
standard and enormous amounts of funding were being spent on developing a wide array of technologies in the color market. Kaiser was unable to find anyone interested in developing another black and white system, and after the government contracts ran out, stopped funding development.
124:, his employer at the time, but they didn't find the concept interesting. Returning from Eniwetok he next approached the Radiation Laboratory, but they too declined to take up development. He decided to build a thin CRT prototype on his own. He rented space in the basement of a
34:. An extended patent battle followed with a similar technology developed in the United Kingdom and planned commercial production for the home market never started. Further development was carried out by a number of companies, including
271:
circuits. Switching the plates on and off at high frequencies and high voltages is a major problem, even today, and a number of different systems were described to accomplish this, including an optical-mechanical system similar to the
136:
It was one thing to draw a dot on the screen and move it around, it is another entirely to make a working television. Looking for development capital, Aiken started shopping the concept around to anyone who expressed an interest.
467:
180:
trainer, which required a transparent phosphor so the pilot could look through the display and out of the canopy. With their funding secure, Kaiser set up a new laboratory in
63:
in 1941. Originally expecting to graduate in the Class of 1942, he decided to take a year off and work in industry. He got a job at the Kaiser
Shipyards plant number 2 in
449:
816:
1109:
256:
The plates were charged relative to the bars to provide deflection, bending the beam to travel between the bars and down the face of the tube.
83:
552:
763:
248:
Aiken developed a number of different tube designs while working with Kaiser, a number of which were described in U.S. Patent 2,795,731.
71:, Aiken's selective service status was declared as category 1-B. He was one of seven people in the country "frozen" in their jobs by
164:
had heard about his work and were very interested in developing it as an interactive plotting table for displaying the data from
161:
42:
after the patents had expired. The displays were only produced in small quantities for military applications and oscilloscopes.
87:
495:, "Television Receiver", William Ross Aiken/Kaiser Aircraft & Electronics, filed 21 January 1955, issued 18 December 1956
30:. Originally designed in the early 1950s, a small number of tubes were built in 1958 for military use in a collaboration with
736:
1035:
810:
224:) first came to their attention. Gabor's design was similar in that it used an offset gun and deflection plates behind the
751:
884:
507:, "Electronic Device", William Ross Aiken/Kaiser Aircraft & Electronics, filed 15 December 1955, issued 24 March 1959
1083:
489:, "Cathode Ray Tube", William Ross Aiken/Kaiser Aircraft & Electronics, filed 4 December 1953, issued 11 June 1957
798:
757:
501:, "Electronic Device", William Ross Aiken/Kaiser Aircraft & Electronics, filed 24 August 1955, issued 2 June 1958
1120:
803:
545:
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collaborated on the development of a small transistorized computer to display basic navigation information, while
199:
space that might be able to help fund the effort of taking the tube into commercial production. At the time, the
1139:
822:
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82:, and was instead sent to work in industry in a variety of jobs. He spent the next six years working for the
695:
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The patents describe a number of different systems for constructing the deflection plates, including both
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sent an engineer to examine it, but declined to fund development believing it was being faked.
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Aiken went on to develop a number of unrelated display technologies, similar to the
1104:
843:
645:
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was brought in to develop the super-flat glass plates needed to front the display.
173:
149:'s research labs, called Aiken to set up a meeting, but Aiken demanded they sign a
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110:
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128:, and developed a working tube that could draw and move a dot around the screen.
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It was during this time that he came up with the idea for a new type of thin
72:
67:, and was promoted to head of the electrical department. When the US entered
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978:
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While development continued, Kaiser started looking for partners in the
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eventually forming "Display
Technology Corporation" to produce them.
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being built there. He was then put in charge of developing an
78:
When the war ended Aiken was drafted, but declared 4-F due to
650:
668:
200:
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It was about this time that the similar tube developed by
39:
520:"Thin Tube Foretells Wall TV and Sky View for Air Pilot"
456:, Volume 31 Issue 11 (November 1984), pp. 1605–1608
75:
and unable to leave their job under any circumstances.
16:
First successful flat panel black and white television
102:. While working on these developments he was sent to
450:"History of the Kaiser-Aiken, thin cathode ray tube"
98:
for measuring the temperature of the fireballs from
817:
Thick-film dielectric electroluminescent technology
157:to an accounting error, development almost ended.
1110:Comparison of CRT, LCD, plasma, and OLED displays
1131:
463:, Volume 15 Issue 2 (March 1984), pp. 86–91
546:
120:Having sketched out the idea, he went to the
84:University of California Radiation Laboratory
764:Surface-conduction electron-emitter display
172:. They later added an additional role as a
675:Active-Matrix Organic light-emitting diode
553:
539:
459:A.W. Woodhead, "Flat cathode ray tubes",
428:
426:
162:United States Naval Research Laboratory
1132:
560:
317:
315:
203:was in the process of introducing its
88:Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
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454:IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices
423:
411:
811:Ferroelectric liquid crystal display
399:
375:
885:Light-emitting electrochemical cell
468:"Interview with William Ross Aiken"
387:
363:
351:
339:
327:
312:
13:
1084:Large-screen television technology
512:
220:(better known as the developer of
106:during a series of nuclear tests.
14:
1156:
758:Organic light-emitting transistor
474:, Interview #322, 30 October 1996
1121:Comparison of display technology
131:
113:(CRT) while he was working with
752:Electroluminescent Quantum Dots
441:
823:Laser-powered phosphor display
294:
243:
1:
1089:Optimum HDTV viewing distance
1079:History of display technology
967:Computer-generated holography
302:"Geer Experimental Color CRT"
283:
228:, but differed in having the
122:U.S. Atomic Energy Commission
90:, designing controls for the
669:Organic light-emitting diode
663:Light-emitting diode display
7:
251:The primary design used an
10:
1161:
879:Vacuum fluorescent display
603:Electroluminescent display
479:
211:
55:William Ross Aiken was an
50:
45:
28:black and white television
1118:
1066:
1028:
987:
932:
836:
735:
726:Liquid crystal on silicon
630:
577:
568:
59:undergraduate student at
23:was the first successful
917:Fourteen-segment display
720:Digital Light Processing
288:
151:non-disclosure agreement
923:Sixteen-segment display
609:Rear-projection display
526:, January 1958, pg. 104
306:www.earlytelevision.org
770:Field-emission display
685:Liquid-crystal display
186:Shockley Semiconductor
57:electrical engineering
1140:Television technology
907:Eight-segment display
901:Seven-segment display
505:U.S. Patent 2,879,443
499:U.S. Patent 2,837,691
493:"Description 179,404"
487:U.S. Patent 2,795,731
461:Physics in Technology
182:Palo Alto, California
1145:Vacuum tube displays
1029:Display capabilities
912:Nine-segment display
614:Plasma display panel
448:William Ross Aiken,
197:consumer electronics
65:Richmond, California
36:Sinclair Electronics
1058:See-through display
962:Holographic display
640:Quantum dot display
472:IEEE History Center
466:Jaimeson Cobleigh,
153:and Baker refused.
1100:Color Light Output
1094:High Dynamic Range
896:Dot-matrix display
891:Lightguide display
562:Display technology
168:in anti-submarine
96:x-ray spectrometer
1127:
1126:
1053:Always-on display
844:Electromechanical
832:
831:
524:Popular Mechanics
238:flip-disc display
160:By this time the
32:Kaiser Industries
1152:
1105:Flexible display
1067:Related articles
947:Autostereoscopic
646:Electronic paper
592:Cathode-ray tube
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205:color television
174:heads up display
147:General Electric
111:cathode ray tube
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513:Further reading
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100:nuclear weapons
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786:Liquid crystal
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132:Kaiser enters
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115:oscilloscopes
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1015:Transparency
988:Static media
942:Stereoscopic
523:
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442:Bibliography
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253:electron gun
250:
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235:
230:electron gun
218:Dennis Gabor
215:
194:
159:
155:
143:Walter Baker
135:
119:
108:
77:
73:Admiral Land
69:World War II
54:
20:
18:
979:Fog display
952:Multiscopic
869:Fiber-optic
781:Quantum dot
274:Nipkow disk
244:Description
178:T-2 Buckeye
170:helicopters
126:post office
61:UC Berkeley
1134:Categories
1020:Laser beam
974:Volumetric
934:3D display
874:Nixie tube
854:Split-flap
739:generation
713:Blue Phase
633:generation
580:generation
284:References
92:cyclotrons
86:, today's
25:flat panel
21:Aiken tube
1074:Scan line
1048:DisplayID
1005:Neon sign
995:Monoscope
837:Non-video
598:Jumbotron
433:Interview
418:Interview
406:Interview
394:Interview
382:Interview
370:Interview
358:Interview
346:Interview
334:Interview
322:Interview
222:holograms
166:sonobuoys
957:Hologram
864:Eggcrate
849:Flip-dot
795:display
776:Laser TV
747:microLED
677:(AMOLED)
631:Current
587:Eidophor
435:, pg. 14
420:, pg. 11
408:, pg. 12
384:, pg. 10
226:phosphor
176:for the
104:Eniwetok
1041:CEA-861
671:(OLED)
656:Gyricon
480:Patents
396:, pg. 9
372:, pg. 7
360:, pg. 6
348:, pg. 5
336:, pg. 4
324:, pg. 2
212:Lawsuit
190:Corning
51:Genesis
46:History
925:(SISD)
819:(TDEL)
813:(FLCD)
760:(OLET)
728:(LCoS)
687:(LCD)
665:(LED)
642:(QLED)
616:(PDP)
80:asthma
1096:(HDR)
919:(FSD)
903:(SSD)
887:(LEC)
881:(VFD)
825:(LPD)
772:(FED)
766:(SED)
737:Next
722:(DLP)
651:E Ink
605:(ELD)
594:(CRT)
289:Notes
1036:EDID
858:Vane
804:TMOS
799:IMoD
793:MEMS
620:ALiS
578:Past
267:and
201:NTSC
38:and
19:The
708:LED
701:IPS
691:TFT
40:RCA
1136::
696:TN
522:,
470:,
452:,
425:^
314:^
304:.
276:.
184:.
554:e
547:t
540:v
308:.
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