John N. Shive

Scientific career John N. Shive joined Bell Telephone Laboratories in 1939. The spherical sundial on campus, in front of the bookstore and next to the library, is dedicated to his memory.

Transistor development On January 30, 1948 Shive discovered that gold-plated tungsten point contacts on a p-type layer of germanium grown on an n-type substrate gave "a terrific triode effect". On February 13, he also discovered that a transistor consisting of bronze contacts on the surface of an n-type substrate without a p-layer gave "gains up to 40× in power!" Shockley later admitted that the workings of the team were a "mixture of cooperation and competition". He also admitted that he kept some of his own work secret until his "hand was forced" by Shive's 1948 advance.

Phototransistor In 1948 Shive invented the phototransistor that used a beam of light, instead of a wire, as the emitter of a point contact transistor, generating holes that flow to the collector. The phototransistor was eventually used in the nationwide direct distance dialing system. He was responsible for curriculum and administration of educational programs provided to employees of Bell Laboratories. and Similarities in Wave Behavior,

Patents Shive held several patents including Selenium rectifier and method of making it, Directly heated thermocouple, Photoresistive translating device, Selenium rectifier including tellurium and method of making it, Apparatus for and method of treating selenium rectifiers, Semiconductor photoelectric device, Conditioning of semiconductor translators, Semiconductor amplifier, and Alternating gate current.

Books Shive authored three books during his career, beginning with The Properties, Physics, and Design of Semiconductor Devices (1959), a book about semiconductor devices. His last book, Similarities in Physics (1982), was coauthored with Robert L. Weber. He was also one of the editors of Transistor Technology, Volume 1.

Honors John N. Shive was a fellow of the American Physical Society and a Senior Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. He was also a chairman of the Advisory Committee on the Pre-College Physics Project of the American Institute of Physics.

Selected works J. N. Shive, Physical Review, vol. 75, p. 318, 1949. J. N. Shive, Physical Review, vol. 75, p. 689, 1949. J. A. Becker and J. N. Shive, "The Transistor – A New Semiconductor Amplifier," The Electrical Engineer., vol 68, no. 3, pp. 215–221, Mar. 1949. J. N. Shive, "The Properties of Germanium Phototransistors", JOSA, vol. 43, no. 4, pp. 239–243, 1953. John N. Shive and Robert L. Weber, Similarities in Physics. New York, NY: Wiley, 1982. .