When Robert Dennard earned his PhD in electrical engineering from Carnegie Mellon in 1958, it would have been hard to imagine computing circa 2009. Yet, Dennard feels that while he was a student he got all the tools he needed to not just stay ahead of the curve of computer science, but to have a role in drawing that curve himself.
"What I learned was how to think like an engineer," he says. "Carnegie Mellon built up a trust, a trust in engineering, and a trust that, if you give me a problem—doesn't matter the technology—I'll figure out how to do it."
Dennard went straight from Carnegie Mellon to IBM, where he has worked for 51 years and counting, most of them at the Thomas J. Watson Research Center in New York. He holds a patent for every year he's been there, including perhaps his most significant, the Dynamic Random Access Memory. In the world of computing, DRAM has provided a way to make memory smaller, cheaper, and more reliable. Dennard developed his DRAM concept in 1966, followed by a patent in 1968. One of the properties of DRAM is low power, which has been very important in enabling mobile, laptop, and handheld computing devices.
For his contributions, Dennard was recently awarded one of the engineering profession's highest honors—the 2009 Charles Stark Draper Prize, presented by the National Academy of Engineering. The $500,000 annual award honors those whose accomplishments have significantly benefited society.
—Bradley A. Porter (HS'08)
