Russell Ohl

After quickly making it through high school and entering Pennsylvania State University at the age of 16, Russell Ohl became fascinated with radio technology. In his senior year he took a course on the principles behind vacuum tubes --used at the time to rectify radio signals. The subject of radio interested him so much that he continue research in radio for the rest of his life. 

      Ohl began working at Bell Labs in 1927. At that point, radio tuners were only able to pick up the lowest frequencies of radio waves. Ohl wanted to find a receiver that could handle higher frequencies and he believed that silicone semiconductors might hold the answers.

       One of the ingots (crystal formations of silicone) obtained by Ohl in this work actually contained a region that was n-type and another that was p-type silicone, with a very sharp interface between the two types. The so-called p-n junction was to play a crucial role in the ultimate development of the transistor. The research group was astonished by the magnitude of the voltage that could be generated generated between the two halves when the junction was illuminated. This principle was shared with others in the company and it was the breakthrough that was needed to lead to the invention of the first transistor. 

        When Ohl's coworkers were shown the junction found by Ohl and its remarkable properties, they decided that the discovery was probably of huge value to the electronics industry and that the knowledge should be retained at the highest level of company secrecy until its true significance could be explored. That push for further development was inevitably left until 1945, by which time Walter Brattain and William Shockley, joined by John Bardeen, were active in the company. They became the awarded inventors of the first transistor.