Walter Houser Brattain ( / ˈ b r æ t n / BRAT -n ; February 10, 1902 – October 13, 1987) was an American physicist. He shared the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics with John Bardeen and William Shockley for creating the point-contact transistor. Brattain spent much of his life studying surface states.
Early life and education
Walter Houser Brattain was born on February 10, 1902, in Amoy, China (now called Xiamen), to American parents, Ross R. Brattain and Ottilie Houser. His father was of Scottish descent. His mother's parents were both immigrants from Stuttgart, Germany. Ross worked as a teacher at the Ting-Wen Institute, a private school for Chinese boys. Ottilie was a talented mathematician. Both Ross and Ottilie graduated from Whitman College. Ottilie and young Walter returned to the United States in 1903. Ross joined them later that year. The family lived in Spokane, Washington, for several years before moving to a cattle ranch near Tonasket, Washington, in 1911.
Brattain attended high school in Washington. He studied for one year at Queen Anne High School, two years at Tonasket High School, and one year at Moran School for Boys. He then enrolled at Whitman College, where he studied physics with Benjamin H. Brown and mathematics with Walter A. Bratton. In 1924, he earned his B.S. degree, majoring in both Physics and Mathematics. Brattain and his classmates Walker Bleakney, Vladimir Rojansky, and E. John Workman all had successful careers in science. They later became known as "the four horsemen of physics." Brattain's brother, Robert, also attended Whitman College and became a physicist.
Brattain earned his M.A. from the University of Oregon in 1926 and his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1929. At Minnesota, he studied quantum mechanics, a new area of science, with John Van Vleck. His doctoral thesis, written under John T. Tate, was titled Efficiency of Excitation by Electron Impact and Anomalous Scattering in Mercury Vapor.
Career and research
From 1928 to 1929, Brattain worked at the National Bureau of Standards in Washington, D.C., where he helped create tools to measure frequency using piezoelectric materials. In August 1929, he joined Joseph A. Becker at Bell Telephone Laboratories as a research physicist. Together, they studied how heat affects the movement of electric charges in copper oxide rectifiers. Brattain attended a lecture by Arnold Sommerfeld. Later experiments on thermionic emission supported Sommerfeld’s theory. They also studied the surface properties of tungsten and how thorium atoms attach to its surface. Through research on semiconductor surfaces, Brattain discovered the photo-effect at the surface of a semiconductor. This work was considered one of his most important contributions to solid-state physics by the Nobel Committee.
At the time, the telephone industry relied heavily on vacuum tubes to control and amplify electrical current. Vacuum tubes were unreliable and inefficient, so Bell Labs aimed to develop a better alternative. As early as the 1930s, Brattain worked with William Shockley on a semiconductor amplifier using copper oxide, an early but unsuccessful attempt to create a field-effect transistor. Other researchers also studied semiconductors, using materials like germanium and silicon, but pre-war research lacked clear direction and strong theoretical support.
During World War II, Brattain and Shockley worked separately on submarine detection research with the National Defense Research Committee at Columbia University. Brattain’s team developed magnetometers capable of detecting changes in Earth’s magnetic field caused by submarines. In 1944, Brattain patented a design for a magnetometer head.
In 1945, Bell Labs reorganized and created a group focused on solid-state physics research related to communication technologies. The group was led by Shockley and Stanley O. Morgan, with support from Mervin Kelly, Bell Labs’ vice-president for research. John Bardeen joined the group later. Bardeen was a close friend of Brattain’s brother, Robert, who introduced them in the 1930s. They often played bridge and golf together. Bardeen was a quantum physicist, Brattain was skilled in materials science, and Shockley was an expert in solid-state physics.
At the time, theories suggested Shockley’s field-effect transistor, made of silicon coated on a metal plate, should work. He asked Brattain and Bardeen to investigate why it did not. In November and December, they tested the device to find the issue. Bardeen theorized that surface variations might trap charge carriers. Brattain and Bardeen achieved a small level of amplification by pressing a gold point into silicon and surrounding it with distilled water. Using germanium instead of silicon improved amplification for low-frequency currents.
On December 16, Brattain developed a method to place two gold contacts close together on a germanium surface. He described the process: “Using this double contact, a germanium surface was treated with an electrical current, cleaned with water, and had gold spots applied. The gold contacts were pressed onto the surface, and both rectified electricity well. One contact acted as a grid, and the other as a plate. A positive electrical charge on the grid was needed for amplification.”
Bardeen explained that experiments with gold spots showed holes were introduced into the germanium, increasing charge near the surface. The terms “emitter” and “collector” were used to describe this. Shockley later suggested the charge was balanced by electrons in the material, leading to the junction transistor design. Later experiments confirmed both surface states and bulk electrons played a role in the point-contact transistor.
On December 23, 1947, Brattain, Bardeen, and Shockley demonstrated the first working transistor to colleagues at Bell Labs. The transistor amplified electrical signals and enabled digital information processing, becoming a key part of modern electronics.
After the 1947 demonstration, Bell Labs focused on the Surface States Project, keeping research secret at first. Internal meetings shared progress, and patents were filed for the point-contact transistor. Concerns arose that researchers at Purdue University might discover the transistor first and publish their findings.
On June 30, 1948, Bell Labs announced the transistor publicly, sharing knowledge freely to avoid classifying it as a military secret. This allowed widespread research and development. Bell Labs held open symposia in 1951, 1952, and 1956, attended by scientists from universities, industries, and military groups worldwide.
Shockley believed he deserved full credit for the transistor invention and excluded Bardeen and Brattain from new research, particularly the junction transistor, which he patented. His theory was important for future electronics but took years to build practically.
Brattain later worked with C. G. B. Garrett and P. J. Boddy on solid surface properties and the “transistor effect.” Bardeen left Bell Labs in 1951 for the University of Illinois, where he later won a second Nobel Prize for superconductivity theory. Shockley left Bell Labs in 1953 to start Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory.
In 1956, Brattain, Bardeen, and Shockley were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics by King Gustaf VI Adolf of Sweden “for their researches on semiconductors and their discovery of the transistor effect.” Bardeen and Brattain were recognized for the point-contact transistor; Shockley for the junction transistor. Brattain reportedly said, when told of the award, “I certainly appreciate the honor. It is a great satisfaction to have done something in life and to have been recognized for it in this way.”
Personal life and death
Brattain married twice. His first wife was a chemist named Keren Gilmore. They got married in 1935 and had a son named William in 1943. Keren passed away on April 10, 1957. The next year, Brattain married Emma Jane (Kirsch) Miller, who was the mother of three children.
Brattain died from Alzheimer's disease on October 13, 1987, in Seattle when he was 85 years old. He is buried in City Cemetery in Pomeroy, Washington.