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Out to Murray Hill to Play: An Early History of Transistors

James M. Early, Life Fellow, IEEE
AbstractThis paper contains a personal account of some of the initial years in the development of the transistor, with emphasis on accomplishments and personalities at Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ, where much of the activity took place.
TABLE I CLASSIC DECADES

I. PLAYERS AND THE STAGE N THE title, early is an adjective. Transistor technology has evolved through various phases, in rough correspondence with the decades since the invention of the transistor. Table I illustrates the broad concepts which dominated the work in each of the intervening decades. The focus of this paper is the 1950s. It is aimed at giving readers a sense of those times so as to provide a degree of contact with the past, and to help them see order in the history of microelectronics. Through experiments seeking understanding and use of surface physics in germanium, John Bardeen and Walter Brattain found the transistor effect and invented the point contact transistor on December 16, 1947. A photograph of one of their first devices is shown in Fig. 1. While they widened the experiments and pondered the data and surface state models of the structures, Bill Shockley, challenged by their accomplishment, worked out by late January 1948 a bulk hypothesis for transistor action. His key assumption was the electrical injection of excess minority mobile charge carriers into a quasi-neutral bulk semiconductor. He also, in the same work, invented the junction diode and the bipolar transistor. Considered separately, the point contact work and the junction work provoked by it, each richly deserved a Nobel Prize. The Nobel committee joined the contributions, and awarded the contributors a single prize, blurring distinctions which seem clear to us. The trio, pictured in Fig. 2, began our work magnificently. The whole of humanity is in their debt. Two other contributors stand far above the crowd, Jack Morton and Bob Noyce. Although not a visible technical contributor in semiconductors, Morton, with remarkable force, vigor, and persistence, encouraged the research aimed at realizing Shockleys junction concepts, directed the development work based on their research, and persuaded Bell Labs management not only to patent and publish freely but also to make the technology available to licensees within the entire free world. Noyce was a key figure in the establishment of Fairchild Semiconductor, and invented the form of integrated circuit

Fig. 1. Primitive transistor. The small dark rectangle on the formed metal support at lower left center is polycrystalline germanium. The triangle impinging on it is an insulator with metal on near and far surfaces, making two contacts to the crystal (Courtesy of Lucent TechnologiesBell Labs Innovations).

Manuscript received July 1, 1999; revised April 8, 2001. The review of this paper was arranged by Editors P. Asbeck and T. Nakamura. The author, retired, is at 708 Holly Oak Drive, Palo Alto, CA 94303-4142 USA. Publisher Item Identifier S 0018-9383(01)09056-6.

which dominates todays electronics. Specifically, in a single structure, he added to prior concepts of monolithic integration the features of isolation by means of reverse biased junctions, insulation of interconnections from underlying structures by silicon dioxide, and interconnections of evaporated aluminum etched into desired electrical configurations.

00189383/01$10.00 2001 IEEE

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beautiful straight lines on semilog paper! Some properties were mysterious, however. For example, the transistors with lowest collector-base leakage current ( ) typically had the highest base resistances. Of the best units, those with highest current gain often had the highest collector resistances and the highest base resistances. These results were puzzling. Then, in January 1952, on my way to an internal talk on some subject, it occurred to me that the transistor should be looked from a node viewpoint rather than a loop. After all, the leakage was surely in parallel with whatever else was going on. So, almost as soon as I had settled into my conference room chair with its broad arm for note-taking, out came the pad or notebook and I wrote:

which was a standard common base circuit model for the BJT. with On the next line came differentiation with respect to held constant:

Fig. 2. William Shockley, seated, and John Bardeen, left, listen as Walter Brattain describes the BardeenBrattain invention (Courtesy of Lucent Technologies-Bell Labs Innovations).

Bell Laboratories was the birthplace and childhood home of our field. Laboratory 252 was Jack Mortons large semiconductor device exploratory development organization at Murray Hill. Ian Munroe Ross headed one of the several units within 252. More than two decades later, he became president of Bell Labs. By late 1957, many Bell Labs semiconductor people, including John Bardeen and Bill Shockley, had left to join other organizations. My own first task at Bell Labs, beginning in September 1951, was preliminary characterization of germanium bipolar junction transistors. This included measuring, setting acceptance limits, and helping to create engineering descriptions of the devices for users and for guidance of engineers at the Allentown, PA branch laboratory who would do final characterization. Along with this work, I was also asked to measure and report on samples of germaniumindium alloy junction transistors from General Electric and later, similar but greatly improved devices from RCA. Our primary dynamic model was a common base equivalent tee network with a junction diode in the emitter arm, base resistance in the ground leg of the tee, and collector resistance in series with a voltage generator in the output arm. The transistors really worked, with characteristics somewhat like those of vacuum triodes and pentodes! Shockleys theory was remarkably accurate. Currents increased exponentially with forward emitter-base voltage over many, many decades, giving

The term told the story. Obviously, as collector voltage was raised, the depletion layer became thicker and the base became thinner! It was wonderful, beautiful in its prediction of unexplained features of BJTs. And I was the lucky first person to recognize what was going on. As was usual, I reported this result promptly to supervision and also shared it with other colleagues, particularly our car pool from Morristown, NJ, This group (all of whom had gone past, rather than through, the first grade of school) included at that time J. Linville, J. E. Thomas, and G Breitag. In the three years I was a member of this group, J. J. Ebers and J. L. Moll were also at times members. An outgrowth of this discovery was the use of the -parameters, which I proposed as an alternative to the equivalent tee parameters. They were accepted because, for comparable performance limits, they gave higher manufacturing yields. Another outgrowth was my first published work, given initially at the 1952 Device Research Conference and appearing in the November 1952 Transistor Issue of PROCEEDINGS OF THE IRE. In another follow-on to Shockleys work, analysis of the behavior of BJTs at high forward currents showed me that the conductivity modulation of the base which occurs results in an approximate halving of the (minority carrier) base transit time. At the same Device Research Conference, I congratulated Bill Webster of RCA on his analysis of this effect (he was first to discover as well as to publish, Im sure). The most astonishing (to me) follow-on was realization that the classic junction transistor was, in one important respect, not really designed. While sitting next to my supervisor, K. D. Smith, at an April talk in Arnold Auditorium (BTL-MH), I suddenly saw that BJTs should be designed with relatively thick collector barrier regions and very thin base layers, resulting in far higher frequency responses and significantly higher breakdown voltages. I didnt write this down, but recalled the thought on May 22, 1952. That evening I made long entries in my patent notebook, covering and elaborating on this concept. The next

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TABLE II PARADIGMS IN TRANSISTOR DEVELOPMENT AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES

morning, on the trip to Murray Hill, I told my poolmates that I had invented the ideal bipolar transistor. These entries went to BTLs patent department promptly and a patent application was filed in December. These entries were the starting point for related later work and papers. Now lets look at these events as part of a structured view of semiconductor device evolution. II. PARADIGMS IN TRANSISTOR DEVELOPMENT Paradigm, in the work of Thomas Kuhn, refers to recognized scientific achievements that for a time provide model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners. Kuhn devised this generalization at a grand level of thought and modeling (e.g.; quantum mechanics). Here, I apply his model to give structure to successive transistor concepts and the advances associated with them. The invention of the transistor itself resulted a succession of new paradigms for electron device development. Table II presents a number of the most important of these, and the devices and other results from them. The Bell Labs assumption of the late 1930s that a semiconductor amplifier was possible had led to the point contact transistor. The associated hypothesis that charge injection into surface states was the dominant mechanism lasted scarcely two months. It was replaced by Shockleys proposal of junctions injecting minority charge carriers into bulk material. J. N. Shive found transistor action between point contacts on opposite faces of a thin germanium wedge even though the contacts were far apart on the device surface. Shockleys theory was the new paradigm. From it came 1949 and 1950 experiments producing junction diodes and grown junction transistors. Other new technologies resulted, including alloy junctions in germanium and silicon and surface barrier transistors. The tee equivalent circuit was carried over from the point contact modeling, and I believe, unconsciously shaped the thinking of most in the field. A major modification of the Shockley paradigm began when the space charge layer widening (base thinning) effect was discovered theoretically, then proven experimentally, in January,

1952. In May of that year, the natural fruit of this vision came forth in the proposals that bipolar transistors should have very thin heavily doped bases and relatively thick collector barriers, and that the collector bodies (beyond the barrier) should be of very low resistivity, so as to hold collector series resistance usefully low. Websters early 1952 high injection level analysis was also an offspring of the basic Shockley theory. In the wake of the paradigm modifications, a stream of new structures emerged. In the first, a crystal was snatched from its melt soon after base doping, so that the surface was a thin, heavily doped n-layer. A wafer was cut to include this surface, and thinned from the cut side. Emitters and collectors were then added by the indium alloy process, resulting in the first transistors to go beyond the range predicted under the original Shockley paradigm. This kluge was soon surpassed by diffused base transistors, which had alloy emitters and diffused base in Ge, and were double diffused in Si. At Texas Instruments (TI), the diffused base was rapidly incorporated into grown junction transistors, resulting in the first commercial silicon diffused base transistors. The low resistivity collector body was slower to come. It first appeared in the germanium micro-alloy (emitter)-diffused (base) transistor in 1957 or 1958. It grew out of the micro-alloy transistor, itself an offspring of the surface barrier transistor. After diffusion of a base from one side, each individual transistor chip was thinned locally be controlled electrochemical etching of the opposite surface, and electrodes were plated and alloyed. On resistance was very low. The epitaxial transistors in 1960 had higher but adequately low body resistance and cost much less, being batch processed and also using less semiconductor per device, and so doomed the MADT to extinction. A key concept far slower to come to life was the packageless transistor. With no need for large power and high operating vacuum, and with the action inside a solid, it was hoped that the vacuum-tight enclosure could be omitted. The water-soluble germanium oxide, however, had to be sealed dry and hot for device stability. The approach seemed necessary initially for the highly successful silicon diffused structures. Around the end of the decade, however, the planar process, particularly the planar II, through its much improved control of alkali ion contamination offered real hope for getting rid of the seal. The final step lay in the identification of the alkali-impervious character of silicon nitride in 1965 and the rapid development of practical technology for its use late that year, followed gradually by widespread exploitation of its potential, not only as a coating over the oxide, but also as a coating over the metallized device. Paradigms, at best, inspire creation, and, at worst, stifle the imagination. Given that natures laws are unfailingly enforced, even when not known, technical people are remarkably creative. III. LEARNING FROM THE PAST From the early developments in microelectronics, many lessons can be learned. Among the most important of these are the following. 1) Pioneers solve the easy problems. In the arts, in science or technology, and in exploration, successful pioneers have marked out new territory. Examples that come to mind

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include W. Shakespeare, for the area of writing plays in English; J. W. von Goethe, for the area of writing poems in German; C. Columbus, for discovering new continents, and so forth. Later workers are constrained by the contributions of the pioneers. My own easy problem was space-charge layer widening. As explained above, I derived the basic components of the theory in a few minutes. I could scarcely believe my luck; it turned out that no one had found it before me. 2) The most powerful tool is a theory. Shockleys work had enormous direct impact and, I believe, stimulated greatly the whole of science. 3) On a first independent task, finding theory useless is bad for young engineers and scientists. Some young scientists assigned to work on the point contact transistor found in its empirical behavior no place for theory, and left the field. 4) For device research, the device itself has been the most sensitive tool. Direct work on the transistor resolved many of the subtlest questions of its behavior. 5) Do the experiment! I once saw and heard Walter Brattain offer this advice to a group of high school students, with characteristic stentorian vigor. He reiterated it and contrasted it to fruitless discussion of what the experiments might yield. 6) Extend the range of the experiment (material, temperature, pressure, electrical test, etc). This dictum generalizes what many have done to enlarge our knowledge of the patterns of nature. Failure to extend the range has kept many (including me) from easy successes. The early days of transistors began wonderfully, built mightily, and became the foundation for a major industry. They also paid our wages, and were great fun. The view of our occupation held by many of us is reflected in the words of my wife, Mary Agnes Early, circa 1956: You go to Murray Hill to play while I take care of the house and the children. Early in my work at Bell Labs, I grasped Bells personnel strategy, which was to hire the ablest persons they could find having suitable background, and subsequently offer them a wide range of problems to attack. In his book The Gifted Child, Paul Witty has expressed that Gifted children organize their play in complex patterns leading to remote goals. The same is true if you replace gifted children by research and development people, and play by work. Finally, you may have heard of the three stonemasons working on the same job. When asked what they were doing, one said earning $50 per hour, another said doing stonework, and the last said building a cathedral. I judge that we have been building a cathedral. IV. SPECIAL INSERT 1 At the 1957 Device Research Confference at Boulder, Colorado, four Bells Labs engineers sang the Bell Calypso, 252 Calypso, Saga of Ross, and Alumni Bell. They carry the spirit of that group of transistor researchers. The following are samples from those songs.

Weve traveled a long way to bring you this song, A brand new calypso were sure to get wrong, About the reform school to which we belong, The Hells Bells Laboratory Its the Hells Bells and buckets of blood, The Hells Bells Laboratory Our walls are all graces by the periodic chart. Bill Shockleys picture is sewn over our hearts. Bardeen and Brattain are our Sweethearts At the Hells Bells Laboratory Its the Hells Bells and buckets of blood, The Hells Bells Laboratory Surface studies weve had to quit, Theory and practice would never fit, We could never get rid of the coating of ... sweet violets The Hells Bells Laboratory Its the Hells Bells and buckets of blood, The Hells Bells Laboratory Publication of papers will help your career. Promotions assured if you write twenty a year. They are used in the washroom of the chief engineer At the Hells Bells Laboratory Its the Hells Bells and buckets of blood, The Hells Bells Laboratory The economy squeeze has pinched more every day. Coffee and tea breaks have been taken away. Theyre hoping to make the transistor pay At the Hells Bells Laboratory Its the Hells Bells and buckets of blood, The Hells Bells Laboratory Jack Mortons office is up in the clouds. He sits there serenely away from the crowds, But if you should cross him, fit yourself a shroud! In our vice development department Poor old transistors makes up sick With 252 were gonna stick. Jim Earlys work is so well organized. No matter what happens hes never surprised, Because by six daughters hes wellsupervised In our vice development department. Poor old transistors makes up sick With 252 were gonna stick. V. SPECIAL INSERT 2 About the author: I was born and raised in Syracuse, NY, second child and second son in a family of nine children blessed my marvelous parents and limited but adequate resources. An outstanding high school physics teacher, the late John Condon, gave me my start in technical analysis. I attended the NY State College of Forestry, from which I received a B. Sc. in 1943, specializing

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in pulp and paper manufacturing. The forestry college taught us well, with long hours and long work. At Ohio State while in the U.S. Army, I found electrical engineering easier and more interesting than the paper industry. Enrolling at Ohio Sate full time (including four years as full-time instructor) after the second World War, I received the M.Sc. and eventually the PhD. in 1951. In graduate school, my advisors, Profs. E. M. Boone and D. J. Kraus wisely gave me almost no guidance in my thesis and dissertation. Through their restraint and encouragement, I became used to choosing and defining my own analytical problems and approaches. I was grateful to them. Looking back, I am even more grateful. In early September of 1951, Bell Laboratories gave a one week introductory transistor in Princeton, NJ. Shockleys book was our prime text. In this world I was young, short on self-confidence, and much in awe of our instructors. There, one day, Shockley told off his then recently-proposed junction field effect transistor. He drew on the board postulated drain voltage characteristics in which the drain current at fixed gate-to-source voltage would initially rise with diminishing slope as it does in actual devices. After saturation is reached, he indicated, the current would gradually cut off, falling to zero. With some trepidation I questioned this, proposing that the drain current could not fall because it was involved in bringing the channel-to-gate voltage to the pinch-off point. He thought for a very short time, agreed, and changed the characteristic to the false pinch-off region we are familiar with. We never talked of the matter again, but he was always cordial and treated me as a technical peer. The incident probably helped my self-confidence in dealing with semiconductor theory. Mary Agnes, my beloved wife, and I have been blessed with two and a half dozen children (thats right, 2+6=8), of whom seven, including the youngest are daughters. ACKNOWLEDGMENT The author is grateful to his many collaborators over the years, who helped make his work in transistor technology

development both fulfilling and enjoyable. This account was developed from material presented at the 1992 Device Research Conference [1], [2]. The author is also very grateful to Peter Asbeck for encouragement to put this talk in print, editing it with sensible emendations and clarifications. Thank you, Peter! REFERENCES
[1] J. M. Early, Classic semiconductor devices-point contact through HSI; Solving easy problems, IEEE Trans. Electron Devices, vol. 39, p. 263, Nov. 1992. , Classic semiconductor devices-point contact through HSI; [2] Solving easy problems, in 50th Annu. Device Res. Conf., Cambridge, MA, June 2224, 1992.

James M. Early (A48SM54F59LF88) was born in Syracuse, NY, in 1922. He received the B.S. degree in pulp and paper manufacturing from New York State College of Forestry, Syracuse in 1943 and the M.Sc. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Ohio State University (OSU), Columbus, in 1948 and 1951, respectively. He served in the U.S. Army from 1943 to 1945. In 1951, he joined Bell Telephone Laboratories at Murray Hill, NJ, as Member of Technical Staff. He worked on grown and alloy germanium transistors, germanium diffused base transistors, silicon diffused transistors, solar cells for Telstar, and integrated circuits. After 18 years at Bell Laboratories, the last seven as a Laboratory Director (Murray Hill 19621964, Allentown, PA 19641969), he joined Fairchild Camera and Instrument at Palo Alto, CA. There, he was Director of Semiconductor Research from 1969 to 1983 and a Technical Advisor to the vice-president of research from 1983 to his retirement in 1986. At Fairchild, he was directly responsible for processes as well as devices. He pushed Fairchild into the use of ion beam implantation, whole wafer lithography, electron beam mask-making, and CCD device development. He contributed technically to bipolar memories, fast ECL circuit technology, CMOS without guard rings, and many CCD projects. He holds about a dozen patents, has published 12 or more papers, and given scores of talks. Dr. Early is a Fellow of AAAS and a member of APS. He has received the Texnikoi and Distinguished Alumnus Awards from OSU and the J. J. Ebers Award from the IEEE Electron Devices Society. He served IEEE and its IRE predecessor on the first transistor standardization committees, on many meeting and program committees, and was active in the annual device research conferences. He served the Advisory Group on Electron Devices (Department of Defense) for 20 years, retiring in 1982 after six years as chairman of the main panel of advisors.