Carver Mead Builds the First Schottky-Barrier Gate Field Effect Transistor

In 1965 American electrical engineer and computer scientist Carver Mead of Caltech built the first working Schottky-barrier gate field-effect transistor: GaAs (gallium arsenide) MESFET (metal-semiconductor field effect transistor). This key amplifying device became a mainstay of high-frequency wireless electronics, used in microwave communication systems from radio telescopes to home satellite dishes and cellular phones. Using band-gap-engineered materials, the device evolved into the HEMT (High-electron-mobility transistor).

Mead, "Schottky Barrier Gate Field Effect Transistor," Proceedings of IEEE 54 (1966) 307−308.