Full name: Crystal Fire: The Birth of the Information Age

Author: Michael Riordan Year: 1997 Rank: Rating: Original Rating: Pop Rating: Genres/categories: History, Science, Non Fiction Purchase/reserch links: LibraryThing Goodreads Amazon ISBNs: 9780393318517 9780393041248 0393318516 0393041247

On December 16, 1947, John Bardeen and Walter Brattain, physicists at Bell Laboratories, jabbed two electrodes into a sliver of germanium. The power flowing from the germanium far exceeded what went in; in that moment the transistor was invented and the Information Age was born. No other devices have been as crucial to modern life as the transistor and the microchip it spawned, but the story of the science and personalities that made these inventions possible has not been fully told until now. Crystal Fire fills this gap and carries the story forward. William Shockley, Bell Labs' team leader and co-recipient of the Nobel Prize with Brattain and Bardeen for the discovery, grew obsessed with the transistor and went on to become the father of Silicon Valley. Here is a deeply human story about the process of invention -- including the competition and economic aspirations involved -- all part of the greatest technological explosion in history. The intriguing history of the transistor -- its inventors, physics, and stunning impact on society and the economy -- unfolds here in a richly told tale."--Science News "Thoroughly accessible to lay readers as well as the techno-savvy. . . . [A] fine book."--Publishers Weekly Similar books: Connections by James Burke Jacquard's Web by James Essinger The Day the Universe Changed by James Burke The Difference Engine by Doron Swade The Knowledge Web by James Burke Computer by Martin Campbell-Kelly A Thread Across the Ocean by John Steele Gordon The Axemaker's Gift by Robert Ornstein ENIAC by Scott McCartney Edison's Eve by Gaby Wood The Clockwork Universe by Edward Dolnick The Code Book by Simon Singh The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan The Gene by Siddhartha Mukherjee A Man on the Moon by Andrew Chaikin The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert Cod by Mark Kurlansky Salt by Mark Kurlansky The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Kean The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough