Dr. Steven R. Hofstein

A well-known scientist with over 40 patents, he has had a long and successful career and his inventions have been chronicled by publications that include the New York Times, Newsweek, Business Week, Electronic Engineering Times, Circuit News, and the U.S. Patent office. He was born in the Bronx, New York, and attended Bronx High School of Science. After he graduated high school he attended Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in New York, a school established in 1859 by Peter Cooper. He received his B.S.E.E. degree from City College of New York in 1959 as part of a work/study program and his M.S.E.E. and Ph.D. degree from Princeton University. As a new graduate in 1960, he joined RCA David Sarnoff Research Center in Princeton, New Jersey where he was assigned the task of fabricating an MOS transistor. He is recognized as a leading figure in early MOS work at RCA where he worked with Fred Heiman, in 1962 to produce the first working MOS integrated circuit. He also worked on RCA?s development of the liquid crystal display with George Heilmeier, which led to the development of color LCD displays. In late 1962 they integrated a single chip containing a multipurpose block of 16 MOS transistors. Their work on the development of silicon insulated-gate field effect transistors was published in RCA and IEEE journals in 1962 and 1963. When he left RCA in 1968, he founded Princeton Electronics Products, Inc., and invented the Lithocon silicon storage tube, which quickly found many uses, such as: Supplying a low dosage portable x-ray system used by airports to inspect packages that may contain bombs; Providing the first diagnostic quality images taken with ultrasound for medical diagnostics; Storing and retrieving images of fingerprints for the FBI; Locating and accessing library microfilm publications; and ?Frame-Snatching? television pictures - storing, altering and playing back single TV frames continuously over a standard TV set. After his success in the scientific research industry, he focused his efforts towards the computer industry by partnering with JRC, a Japanese organization, to build the first-ever computer with a graphical display. The Princeton System 850 Series? architecture, designed and built using the Lithocon storage tube, was the breakthrough in technology that is known as the foundation for the computer-graphic industry. In 1989 he founded a business consulting service company, Ascot Technologies Inc.; now Ati Systems Inc. In 1991, he founded Cognasys LLC, and developed a suite of business solutions, Cognasys ES? that can emulate the reasoning and behavior of human workers who have specialized knowledge and the training needed to solve a problem or clarify uncertainties. Expert Systems are comprised of highly-complex technical solutions historically used by the medical, scientific, engineering, and other similar industries. Cognasys ES is unique in that it is the only application of its type that uses Expert System technology for processing of business transactions.