This morning the Nobel committee awarded the Nobel prize in physics to Willard S. Boyle and George Smith for the invention of  the CCD (charge couple device), and also to Charles Kao whose research led to the creation of fiber-optics. The former two gentlemen did their research while working for Bell Labs, the now defunct research arm of the now-broken up AT&T. What didn’t make the news is that researchers at Bell Labs have now won SEVEN Nobel Prizes in Physics. Bell Labs has also been responsible for the invention, discovery of, or significant contributions to: the laser, Unix, C, C++, electron diffraction, one time pads, 5ESS switches, cell phone technology, solar cells, and the first transatlantic telephone cables. Next to the Xerox PARC, Bell Labs has probably contributed more to our current information age than any other single entity, whether government or private, ever.

Who I wonder, is the next Bell Labs or PARC? Is there any corporate entity right now that engages in the sort of research (and funds it with enough money) to generate this level of research data? The only ones that come to mind are Google and DuPont. DuPont however is slowly fading, and while Google does encourage its employees to do research and non-assigned projects, the results usually take the form of inventions and not discoveries. (Google isn’t that much different from a pharmaceutical company in this respect).

There would seem to be a benefit to not confining research to the government and the universities, capable though they might be. Sometimes a profit motive can help to produce something usable from pure research, and direct the research in practical ways. A corporation will usually make different decisions and hire different employees, ultimately doing different work than their not-for-profit counterparts. Corporations’ relatively higher pay can also attract a higher caliber of researcher, as well as ones who do not want to have to deal with tenure-related bureaucracy.

So you don’t think I’m too radical, I don’t want research to be solely the domain of the for-profit world, and that extreme is probably far less desirable than our current situation. A prudent example is the work of Karl Jansky. In 1931 Jansky was working for Bell labs, and was told to try and find ways to reduce the background noise on transatlantic telephone calls. He set up a large radio telescope in an open field to try and find the source of his background radiation. He discovered, to his great surprise, that there was radiation coming from the center of the milky way galaxy. This discovery was the beginning of the field of radio astronomy. Some have even theorized that Janksy would have also won a Nobel prize for his work had he not passed away before he could be awarded one. (The Nobel committee only awards the prize to living people). Jansky applied for further funding from Bell Labs, but they rejected his proposal as it had no practical bearing on the telephone system, and assigned him to other projects. (Time of course proved Jansky’s discoveries to be of incredible significance).

So where does society stand now? Is research for the purpose of research to be confined largely to the universities and the government, while corporations with deep pockets dabble in it, or am I just the victim of not being able to judge progress without hindsight? Can corporations continue to promote research, or are we better off with non-profits ensuring that new discoveries are not restricted by corporate profit motives?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 6th, 2009 at 2:58 pm by Ari and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.