George A. Philbrick was an American engineer. He was responsible, through his company George A. Philbrick Researches (GAP/R), for the 1953 commercialization and wide adoption of
operational amplifier
An operational amplifier (often op amp or opamp) is a direct coupling, DC-coupled Electronic component, electronic voltage amplifier with a differential input, a (usually) Single-ended signaling, single-ended output, and an extremely high gain ( ...
s, a now-ubiquitous component of analog electronic systems, and the invention and commercialization of electronic
analog computer
An analog computer or analogue computer is a type of computation machine (computer) that uses physical phenomena such as Electrical network, electrical, Mechanics, mechanical, or Hydraulics, hydraulic quantities behaving according to the math ...
s based on the operational amplifier principle. He also created the first electronic training simulator, the Polyphemus. The invention, or co-invention, of the operational amplifier has also been credited to a number of other people, including a war-needs driven Bell Labs team led by Clarence A. Lovell (C. A. Lovell et al., 1940 ff.) and
Loebe Julie Loebe Julie (December 10, 1920 - June 7, 2015) was an American engineer who has been credited with inventing the first operational amplifier circuit with differential inputs (1943), a topology which allowed much greater versatility in applications c ...
.
The actual naming of the operational amplifier likely occurred in the classic 1947 paper by John Ragazzini, et al. However analog computations using op amps as we know them today began with the work of the Clarence Lovell-led war needs group at Bell Labs, around 1940 (acknowledged generally in John Ragazzini's paper). In 1952, George A. Philbrick Researches (GAP/R) introduces the K2-W, considered the “Model T” of op amps.
[Philbrick, G.A. “Designing industrial controllers by analog,” Electronics, vol. 21, no. 6, pp. 108–111, 1948. Analog Circuit Design 12 34]
See also
*
Bob Pease
Robert Allen Pease (August 22, 1940 – June 18, 2011) was an electronics engineer known for analog integrated circuit (IC) design, and as the author of technical books and articles about electronic design. He designed several very successf ...
*
Bob Widlar
Robert John Widlar (pronounced ''wide-lar''; November 30, 1937 – February 27, 1991) was an American electronics engineer and a designer of linear integrated circuits (ICs).
Early years
Widlar was born November 30, 1937, in Cleveland to p ...
External links
The Philbrick Archive* ''EEtimes.com''
Bibliography
* Lovell, C.A., et al., "Artillery Predictor," US Patent 2,404,081, filed May 1, 1941, issued September 24, 1946. (The mathematics of analog computer system using op amps for functions of repeating, inverting and summing amplifiers, plus differentiation).
* Lovell, C.A., et al., "Electrical Computing System," US Patent 2,404,387, filed May 1, 1941, issued July 23, 1946. (An analog computer system using op amps for control).
* Lovell, C. A. "Continuous Electrical Computation," Bell Laboratories Record, 25, March, 1947, pp. 1 14–118. (An overview of various fire-control analog computational circuits of the T10 and M9 systems, many illustrating uses of op amps).
* Nyquist, H. “Regeneration theory,” Bell System Technical Journal, vol. 11, pp. 126–147, Jan. 1932.
* Black, H.S. “Stabilized feedback amplifiers,” Bell System Technical Journal, vol. 13, pp. 1–18, Jan. 1934.
* Bode, H.W. “Relations between attenuation and phase in feedback amplifier design,” Bell System Technical Journal, vol. 19, pp. 412–454, July 1940.
* Lovell, C. A. “Continuous electrical computation,” Bell Laboratories Record, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 114–118, Mar. 1947.
* Ragazzini, J.R., Randall, R.H., and Russell, F.A. “Analysis of problems in dynamics by electronic circuits,” Proceedings of the IRE, vol. 35, pp. 444–452, May 1947.
* Philbrick, G.A. “Designing industrial controllers by analog,” Electronics, vol. 21, no. 6, pp. 108–111, 1948. Analog Circuit Design 12 34.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Philbrick, George A.
American engineers
Analog electronics engineers
Year of death missing