Professor Datta Received the McCoy Award
From Inside Purdue, April 11, 2006:
The Herbert Newby McCoy Award, Purdue's highest honor for research in the sciences, was presented at Honors Convocation to Supriyo Datta, the Thomas Duncan Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
The McCoy Award consists of a monetary prize of $4,000 plus an additional contribution of $7,000 to support the research of the recipient.
The McCoy Award was established in 1964 by Mrs. Ethel Terry McCoy in honor of her husband, a distinguished Purdue alumnus. A native of Indiana, Herbert Newby McCoy studied chemistry at Purdue University, where he received a B.S. degree in 1892 and a M.S. degree in 1893. He earned a Ph.D. at the University of Chicago in 1898. McCoy spent the early part of his career as a professor of chemistry, teaching at North Dakota State University, the University of Utah, and the University of Chicago. During the latter part of his career, he was president of Carnotite Reduction Co. in Chicago and vice president of Lindsay Light and Chemical Co., also in Chicago. He died in 1945 in Los Angeles, Calif.
Students and faculty members in the science departments of Purdue are eligible. All faculty members are invited to submit nominations. Representatives of the science faculties and the president of the University select the recipient. Datta's nominators characterized their intent as "recognition of his seminal scientific contributions to the theory of quantum transport in nanoscale electronic devices and molecular electronics." Spanning chemistry, physics and electrical engineering, they wrote, Datta has produced:
"A sound, conceptual understanding of electronic conduction at the molecular scale.
"The first rigorous quantum simulations of nano- and molecular scale electronic devices.
"The first concept for a spintronic switch (the so-called Datta-Das spin transistor) and more recently for a new kind of spinbased memory."
These advances have received worldwide renown, they wrote.
The shrinking size of transistors since their invention in 1947 has forced rethinking of electrons and current flow, the nominators wrote. Datta explored the problems at the molecular level, using his concepts and computational tools. His approach is being applied to atomic level functions.
This work led to an invitation to give a presentation at the 2002 International Electron Devices Meeting.
"Datta's unique 'bottom-up' view of electronics is an original contribution to the field," the nominators wrote, adding that his books and papers have been cited about 6,000 times.
In conclusion, they wrote, "Through his books, seminars, tutorials, short courses, and full courses at Purdue and online, Supriyo Datta's ideas are shaping the future of electronic devices."