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Follow UsBANGALORE: US President George W Bush has announced the selection of Arun
Netravali, former president of Lucent Technologies' Bell Labs and now chief
scientist at Lucent, as one of this year’s recipients of the US National Medal
of Technology.
Netravali was cited for his "pioneering contributions that transformed
TV from analog to digital, enabling numerous integrated circuits, systems and
services in broadcast TV, CATV, DBS, HDTV, and multimedia over the Internet and
for technical expertise and leadership, which have kept Bell Labs at the
forefront in communications technology."
The National Medal of Technology recognizes men and women who embody the
spirit of American innovation and have advanced the nation's global
competitiveness. The medal recognizes groundbreaking contributions that help
commercialize technologies, create jobs, improve productivity and stimulate the
nation's growth and development. The medal, which is the nation’s highest
honor for achievement in technology, was established by Congress in 1980 and is
administered by the Department of Commerce. The president will present the
medals at a ceremony later this year at the White House.
"This honor highlights what we at Lucent have known for many years: that
Arun Netravali is a brilliant scientist, " commented Lucent chief executive
officer Patricia Russo. "His contributions are playing a significant role
in today’s digital video revolution. He also piloted Bell Labs -- a recipient
of the National Medal of Technology in 1985 — through a critical period in its
long and distinguished history. As a result, the world continues to depend on
Bell Labs today as a leading source of new communications technologies and a
veritable cornucopia of scientific breakthroughs."
The compression technology Netravali developed is essential to digital video
systems used in cable and network television, high-definition television (HDTV),
video telephones, and videoconferencing systems. In addition, his work is the
basis for systems that use streaming video over the Internet, Web sites that
store compressed video, and multimedia computers.
Cable TV set-top boxes, direct broadcast satellite receivers, and HDTV sets
that use the MPEG and HDTV standards rely on Netravali's compression algorithms,
which also made communication services such as video conferencing and Internet
streaming video an economic reality. Netravali led the development of HDTV
technology at Bell Labs in the 1990s, and a video encoder based on Netravali's
work is today used by over 150 TV stations for their HDTV broadcasts. In 1997,
Netravali received an Engineering Emmy Award from the Academy of Television Arts
and Sciences for his work on HDTV.
Netravali served as president of Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies' research and
development division, from 1999 to 2001. Under his leadership, Lucent
dramatically increased the speed with which it was able to move innovations from
lab to market. He now serves as Lucent’s chief scientist, working with the
academic and investment communities to identify important new networking
technologies and advising Lucent's senior management on technical and customer
issues.
Netravali is a member of Tau Beta Phi and Sigma Xi, a fellow of the Institute
of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), and the American Association for
the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and a member of the U. S. National Academy of
Engineering. For his scientific achievements, he has received numerous awards,
including the Alexander Graham Bell Medal (1991), the Computers &
Communications Prize, (1997, NEC, Japan), the Frederik Philips Award from the
IEEE (2000), the National Association of Software and Services Companies
(NASSCOM) Medal in India (2000), and the Kilby Medal from the IEEE (2001).
In 2001, he also received the Padma Bhushan Award from the Indian government,
the nation's third-highest civilian honor.
He has authored more than 170 technical papers and co-authored three books:
Digital Picture Representation and Compression, (Plenum, 1987), Visual
Communications Systems, (IEEE Press, 1989) and Digital Video: An Introduction to
MPEG-2, (Chapman and Hall, 1996). He holds more than 70 patents in the areas of
computer networks, human interfaces to machines, picture processing and digital
video and television.
Netravali was an adjunct professor at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology and has taught graduate courses at City College (NY), Columbia
University and Rutgers University. He has served on the editorial board of the
IEEE, and is currently an editor of several journals. He serves on the board of
a number of organizations.
He received his undergraduate degree from the Indian Institute of Technology,
Mumbai, India, and master's and doctorate degrees from Rice University in
Houston, Texas, all in electrical engineering. He holds an honorary doctorate
from the Ecole Polytechnique Federale in Lausanne, Switzerland.
In addition to the nine US Medals of Science laureates affiliated with Bell
Labs, Netravali joins the seven previous Bell Labs scientists and engineers as
US. Medals of Technology laureates: Kenneth Thompson and Dennis Ritchie (1998)
for creating the UNIX operating system and C Language; Richard Frenkiel and Joel
Engel (1994) for their fundamental contributions to the theory, design and
development of cellular mobile communications systems; Amos Joel (1993) for his
vision, inventiveness and perseverance in introducing technological advances in
telecommunications that have had a major impact on the evolution of the
telecommunications industry; W. Lincoln Hawkins (1992) for his invention and
contribution to the commercialization of long-lived plastic coatings for
communications cable and his leadership in encouraging minorities to pursue
science and engineering careers; and John Mayo (1990) for providing the
technological foundation for information-age communications and for overseeing
the conversion of the national switched telephone network from analog to
digital-based technology. In 1985, Bell Labs as an organization was honored with
the medal for its numerous contributions to modern communications systems. It
was the first institution recognized with this honor.
Including this year's laureates, this honor has been bestowed on 120
individuals and 12 companies. More information about the National Medal of
Technology can be found at http://www.ta.doc.gov/Medal.
With approximately 16,000 employees in 16 countries, Bell Labs is the leading
source of new communications technologies. Bell Labs has generated more than
28,000 patents since 1925 and has played a pivotal role in inventing or
perfecting key communications technologies, including transistors, digital
networking and signal processing, lasers and fiber-optic communications systems,
communications satellites, cellular telephony, electronic switching of calls,
touch-tone dialing, and modems. Bell Labs scientists have received six Nobel
Prizes in Physics, nine US Medals of Science and eight US Medals of Technology.