Barrie Chaplin

G. B. B. "Barrie" Chaplin (27 January 1924 – 12 January 2021) was a British engineer and inventor, and professor emeritus at the University of Essex where he established the Department of Electrical Engineering Science in 1966.^[1]^[2] He was selected by the IET as one of its 95 inspiring engineers and technologists of the past, present, and future and he was included in an exhibition at Savoy Place.^[3]

Born in Cheshire,^[4] Chaplin was a founding father of modern electronics as one of the first to devise circuits for the transistor after its invention in the late 1940s.^[5]^[6]^[7]^[8] Circuit designs devised by Chaplin (some with co-authors) principally in the 1950s, have since become standard building blocks for the complex analogue and digital electronic systems of today.^[9]

His career as an inventor and academic continued until his retirement in 1989. He pioneered many technology breakthroughs including the world's first transistorised digital computer, the world's first transistorised sampling oscilloscope^[10] and active noise and vibration cancellation technologies.^[11]^[12] His output was prolific and wide-ranging, producing a long list of patents and important technical papers and publications throughout his career. Many of his breakthroughs were aired on British television through programmes such as the technology magazine programme Tomorrow's World.^[6]

Chaplin earned his Bachelors, Masters and PhD at Manchester University and served in the RAF during World War II. He worked in the private sector before returning to academia.^[13]^[1]^[14]

Early life

Chaplin was born in the Stockport village of Romiley and began his studies at Manchester University in 1947. He received a first-class honours for his BSc electrical engineering in 1950, completed his MSc in 1951, and PhD in 1953.

During his studies he worked alongside early computing pioneers Tom Kilburn, Frederic C Williams and Alan Turing. They supported his innovative research into transistor circuits and computer design. The output of this pioneering work would be the creation of the world's first transistorised digital computer.^[15]

Early Education

Chaplin's early schooling took place at the Romiley County School in the district of Stockport. Subsequently, he was awarded a scholarship to study at the William Hulme Grammar School in Manchester. ^[2]

World War Two

At the age of 18, Chaplin was drafted into the Royal Air Force in 1942. He had a keen interest in electrical systems, and following a successful aptitude test, he became a radar mechanic, maintaining H2S (Height to Slant Range) radar systems and GEE (Ground Electronic Equipment) radio navigation systems on Avro Lancaster heavy bomber aircraft throughout the remainder of World War Two.^[16]

Education at Manchester University

Following his release from the Royal Air Force in March 1947, Chaplin joined the research staff of the Radar Laboratories of Ferranti in Edinburgh. He left Ferranti in September of that year in order to take a degree course at Manchester University, graduating with a first-class honours BSc in electrical engineering in 1950, subsequently achieving an MSc in 1951 and a PhD in 1953. His MSc and PhD theses were effectively reporting platforms for the extraordinarily innovative and creative transistor circuit and computer design work he carried out at the university during this period. Of particular note; the output of his PhD work was the creation of the world's first transistorised digital computer. During this period, he had daily contact with influential mentors such as Frederic “Freddie” Williams (often known as F C Williams) and Tom Kilburn (co-inventors of the “Williams-Kilburn tube” – a Cathode Ray Tube memory device), and Alan Turing, arguably the father of the modern computer; all keenly supporting Chaplin in his quest to revolutionise the power of computer architectures through the use of the transistor.

Chaplin fortuitously found himself to be at the right place and right time for the push for modern computer development. Manchester University, under the leadership of F C Williams and Tom Kilburn, proved to be the birth-place of the modern computer, a computer project which underwent several name changes throughout the phases of its development. At inception, it was known as the SSEM (Small Scale Experimental Machine), coined the “Manchester Baby”, successfully running its first computer program on 21 June 1948. The next version was named the “Manchester Mk 1”, achieving operational status around October 1949; and in parallel with the development of the Manchester Mk 1, electronic engineering firm Ferranti was commissioned by the government in October 1948 to create a commercially viable version, which became known as the “Ferranti Mk 1”, the first production unit appearing in February 1951. Finally, the university team created the “Manchester Mk 2”, better known as “Meg” (Megacycle Machine), successfully running its first computer program in 1954; and in parallel with the development of Meg, Ferranti produced the first commercial production unit known as “Mercury” in 1957.^[15]

Professor Chaplin at the University of Essex

Chaplin was invited to join the University of Essex as a professor in 1966, where he established the Department of Electrical Engineering Science in that same year, the forerunner of the current School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering. His inventiveness continued unabated throughout his tenure at the university until his retirement in 1989. Although his inventiveness continued to be wide-ranging, his mainstream focus at Essex University was concerned with the invention and development of active noise and vibration technologies, and in improving the relationship between education and industry.^[9]

Inspiring the Next Generation of Electronic Engineers

Chaplin had always been very conscious of the need to develop the skills of young people to fulfil the enormous potential of electronic engineering.

He was concerned that science taught in schools was being left behind by technological advances. In 1969 he devised an Electronic Systems A-level, subsequently spending ten years fighting the Schools Council which refused to approve it on the premise that engineering was too vocational. However, with close support and guidance from Lord Mountbatten, who at that time was chairman of the National Electronics Council, and with whom a firm working friendship quickly developed, Chaplin finally convinced the Schools Council to allow a trial period with the A-level being taught at selected schools. The first of these schools was the Colchester Royal Grammar School, its trial class successfully completing the course in 1975. In 1979, the Schools Council finally approved the A-level for the UK's broad national school curriculum.^[17]

His Legacy

Chaplin profoundly influenced and accelerated the development of electronic technology in the world. He was one of those very rare individuals who had an enhanced vision and perception that enabled him to see a potential future with great clarity, and perhaps more importantly, he possessed the ability and drive to make that future a reality.

For Chaplin, it all started at the University of Manchester, with the newly invented transistor. He even created his own early crude transistors using point-contact crystal diodes that he had salvaged from his wartime service. The world scientific view at the time was that the transistor was not much more than an interesting “solid state” device that might one day replace the thermionic valve which was the mainstay component of electronic systems. But he had the vision to see that to take existing valve-based circuits and essentially attempt to replace the valves with transistors, would hugely limit the much wider potential that he could see for the new device. He could see all those decades ago how the transistor could pave the way for what in time would become known as integrated circuits, thousands or even millions of transistors crammed into one tiny integrated circuit. Consequently, he embarked on inventing circuits for the transistor “from scratch”, circuits that exploited the unique strengths and capabilities of the transistor; and indeed, his circuits are still right here with us today, for instance, in everyday devices we take for granted: computers, phones, radios, televisions, music systems. Just this early stage of his long profusely creative career was quite possibly responsible for foreshortening – arguably by several decades – the development of the modern electronic capability that we all enjoy today.^[7]

Professional Institution Membership

Fellow of the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) – now incorporated into the Institution of Engineering and Technology.

Fellow of the Institution of Electronic and Radio Engineers (IERE) – now incorporated into the Institution of Engineering and Technology.

Books Contributed To

“Electronic Measuring Instruments”, 1954, published by Chapman and Hall.

“Progression in Nuclear Physics”, Vol 5, January 1956, published by Pergamon.

“Handbook of Semiconductor Electronics”, 1956, published by McGraw Hill.

Career Achievement Highlights

1947 – 50

Chaplin achieved a first-class honours BSc in electrical engineering at Manchester University, interspersed with radar research work at Ferranti Ltd (Edinburgh), and electronic valve and digital computer research work at Ferranti Ltd (Moston (Manchester)).

1950 – 53

Chaplin was taken on by F C Williams at Manchester University as a student member of his Electrical Engineering research team. During this period, Chaplin achieved his MSc (thesis title: “The Transistor as a Two State Device”) and PhD (thesis title: “A Method of Designing Transistor Circuits for Computers”).

In 1951 at the age of 27, he was appointed Assistant Lecturer within Manchester University's Department of Electrical Engineering, and in that year he devised and lectured a final year course on transistor circuit design, which was the first course of its kind in the UK by many years, and very likely the first anywhere. Subsequently, he was promoted to Lecturer in 1953 at the age of 29.

1951 – 54

Chaplin gave lectures at Manchester University on semiconductor physics and transistor and thermionic valve circuit design. External lectures were given at Edinburgh University, Copenhagen University and the Borough Polytechnic Institute (now Southbank University), including many individual lectures at the Institution of Electrical Engineering (IEE, now the Institution of Engineering Technology) and various University and Government establishments both at home and abroad.

1952

Chaplin was invited by Professor W E J Farvis at Edinburgh University to give a week's series of lectures on transistor circuit design.

In the same year, Chaplin was invited by Copenhagen University to give 10 seminars on transistor circuit design, and was invited by the IEE to referee more than 100 technical papers that had been submitted.

1953

Chaplin created the world's first transistorised digital computer, a transistorised version of Manchester University's thermionic valve-based “Manchester Mk 2” design, better known as “Meg” (Megacycle Machine).

1954

E H Cooke-Yarborough, Chief Research Scientist at AERE (Atomic Energy Research Establishment) at Harwell, invited Chaplin to take the post of Principal Scientific Officer, to lead an autonomous group charged with applying transistors to the varied needs for electronics and computing in the UK's fledgling nuclear energy programme. Chaplin brought with him his colleagues from Manchester University, A R Owens and R E Hayes, the trio forming what soon became known as “The Manchester Group”. The Manchester Group under Chaplin's leadership has since proved to have been the start of an important technological research relationship between Manchester University and AERE Harwell, which flourishes today, now known as “The University of Manchester at Harwell”.

The Manchester Group's research activity under the leadership of Chaplin was wide-ranging, and included the creation of DC and AC amplifier circuits, nanosecond discriminators, and in 1955, the invention of the world's first transistorised sampling oscilloscope.

Chaplin was promoted to Special Merit Senior Principal Scientific Officer in 1958, while continuing to retain autonomy over his research activities.

At this time, Chaplin started working closely with William Shockley (credited with the invention of the junction transistor) and other innovators at Bell Laboratories in the USA such as John Bardeen and Walter Brattain, ensuring transistor performance characteristics were being tailored as far as possible to suit the needs of the growing breadth of circuit applications that Chaplin was conceiving for the device.

1955

Chaplin invented the world's first transistorised sampling oscilloscope, giving the design to Hewlett-Packard in 1956. Accordingly, Hewlett-Packard went on to become the world's premier manufacturer of sampling oscilloscopes.

1959

Chaplin chaired the first International Convention of Transistors and Associated Semiconductor Devices, which proved to be the watershed between the thermionic valve and transistor eras.

‘Barney’ Oliver, founder and Director of Hewlett Packard's laboratories in California, invited Chaplin to join his laboratory team, in parallel with John (J G) Linvill at Stanford University offering Chaplin a professorship at the university. However, Chaplin wished to remain based in the UK, and he accordingly declined both Hewlett-Packard and Stanford University, instead accepting UK-based Plessey’s invitation for him to take the post of Technical Manager at their Roke Manor research facility in Romsey.

1960

Plessey promoted Chaplin to Chief Scientist at their Roke Manor research facility.

While at Plessey, Chaplin designed and built the memory systems for the prototype transistorised “Atlas” computer that was being developed at Manchester University. The computer went into service in 1962, and was considered to be the world's most powerful computer at the time.

1960 was the first year of Chaplin's annual 3-week visits to Bell Laboratories at Murray Hill in the US, during which he would visit several research groups each day. Many of the researchers in the USA who were involved with the early development of the transistor were now no longer professionally active, leaving a transistor circuit design vacuum that major USA organisations such as Bell Laboratories, General Electric (GE), Radio Corporation of America (RCA), Hewlett Packard and Stanford University acknowledged was being filled by the circuit design groups at Manchester University and AERE Harwell, whom the USA organisations now recognised as the leaders in this field. This recognition accounted for the unusual freedom of access accorded to Chaplin by Bell Laboratories during his visits.

1962

Chaplin designed the first integrated circuits used in UK Army wireless sets.

Chaplin was offered the Chair of Electrical Engineering at the University of Saskatchewan, which he declined.

1966

Chaplin had a second invitation from Hewlett-Packard, this time to become Technical Manager of their UK operation. Furthermore, their invitation letter included a personal message from Bill Hewlett (joint founder of Hewlett-Packard) and ‘Barney’ Oliver (founder and Director of Hewlett-Packard's laboratories), urging him to join the Company.

Around the same time, Chaplin was invited by Lord Weinstock to become Technical Director of the British technology giant, GEC (General Electric Company), an appointment which commanded an automatic knighthood.

However, Chaplin declined both of the above prestigious invitations, as he feared the roles would not allow him to continue his detailed research work. Accordingly, he decided to move from industry back into academia where he felt he could better concentrate on his research with fewer distractions.

Following an invitation from Albert Sloman, Vice Chancellor of Essex University, Chaplin joined the university, subsequently founding and chairing the Department of Electrical Engineering Science, and devising four undergraduate electronic engineering degree course options. Key luminaries that Chaplin recruited for his departmental team included Brian Gaines, John Gedye, Ken Cattermole, John Sparkes, John Turner and Rod Smith.

1967

With the backing of the National Electronics Council under the chairmanship of Lord Mountbatten, Chaplin set up a Colour Television “working party”, to support John Turner's research at Essex University into a beam-indexed technique for colour television CRTs, as a potentially cheaper alternative to existing colour television CRTs adopting the shadowmask technique.

1968

Always keen that academia should integrate more closely with industry, Chaplin founded the UK's first university-based (self-funding) industrial electronics engineering development centre at Essex University, known as the Essex Electronics Centre, specifically to support small local Companies not having the resources to keep abreast of technology advances. To illustrate the diversity of projects that the Essex Electronics Centre took on, in 1978 the Centre worked with a company (Lockwood Graders), to develop an automatic grading system for potatoes on a conveyor belt destined for potato crisps (“chips” in American parlance); this was one of many successful and profitable tie-ups between academia and industry for the Centre, fulfilling Chaplin's vision.

The Essex Electronics Centre, through Chaplin's endeavours, secured research funding from a broad range of Corporations, Companies and organisations, including the Wolfson Foundation. Chaplin also secured research funding from the Wolfson Foundation for projects outside the remit of the Essex Electronics Centre, all proving to be commercially successful. Remarkably, Chaplin secured no less than three highly sought-after Wolfson Unit grants: in 1973 an award of £33,000 to support the Essex Electronics Centre's liaison with local small industry regarding the introduction of modern electronic techniques, in 1980 an award of £100,000 to set up a Wolfson Unit for solving industrial noise problems, and a further award in 1980 of £60,000 for introducing small computer systems to local commercial and trading concerns.

In total (throughout the period 1967 to 1982), Chaplin secured 31 research contracts and grants at Essex University, received from the Wolfson Foundation, the Science and Engineering Research Council, the Ministry of Defence, the Royal Aircraft Establishment, the Electricity Council, and the General Council of British Shipping; amounting to a combined value in the region of £900,000.

Chaplin was invited by Lord Mountbatten to take a position at the National Electronics Council (set up by Lord Mountbatten) as the representative for all UK universities.

With the help of the National Electronics Council, Chaplin set up a Link Scheme to link any interested school with its nearest electronics firm, to foster electronic projects within the school. Chaplin, as national co-ordinator of the Scheme, secured the engagement of all the major electronic firms and organisations in the UK, including the Post Office, BBC and ITV. Subsequently, more than 130 successful school links were created in the UK.

1969

Chaplin used his place on the National Electronics Council to further his desire to make school education more relevant to industry's needs by attempting to introduce Engineering into UK school syllabuses in the radical form of an Electronic Systems A-level course he had developed. Chaplin subsequently found himself embroiled in a long-running battle with the Schools Council who at the time refused to accept the A-level into school education, their argument being that Engineering was an insufficiently pure scientific subject for the school curriculum.

1970

Chaplin was appointed Pro-Vice Chancellor of Essex University, but in 1971 reluctantly resigned in order to facilitate his growing research commitments.

Chaplin was appointed to membership of The Parliamentary and Scientific Committee

1971

Chaplin unveiled an electronic system for detecting and mapping glaucoma eye disease in hospital patients. He developed the system from initial ideas conceived with John Gedye. It was successfully trialled at St Pancras hospital, soon becoming widely used by UK hospitals.

Chaplin was appointed to membership of the Electrical and Systems Engineering Committee of the Science Research Council (now the Science and Engineering Research Council).

1972

Chaplin was appointed by the Home Office to membership of a three-strong committee, advising on communications and data processing within the Police Services.

1973

Chaplin was appointed vice-president of the Institution of Electronic and Radio Engineers (IERE), now the Institution of Engineering and Technology.

The National Research Development Corporation (NRDC), on its 25th anniversary, invited Chaplin to write an article on the Corporation's performance from the viewpoint of the UK's universities. The NRDC was a government body set up to encourage and stimulate development of the British computer industry, hence Chaplin's seminal involvement in early computer research made him an obvious choice to write the article on the NRDC's performance.

[The NRDC endeavoured to stimulate the UK's computer industry by directly placing contracts with selected British computer design Companies; indeed, it enjoyed considerable success in enhancing the British computer industry, although the USA-based computer industry with its greater funding potential would soon prove to dominate.

The NRDC's first contract in 1951 was shared between Ferranti and Manchester University at a value of £400,000. In 1953, the NRDC contracted the Elliot Bros computer design Company (this contract subsequently being transferred to Ferranti), at an overall value of £500,000, culminating in the creation of the Pegasus thermionic valve-based computer which went into production in 1956. The next NRDC contract (in 1958, for £620,000) went to Electric and Musical Industries (EMI) to support its development of its 1100 and 2400 series of computers.

In an attempt to catch up with the USA's increasing lead in computer research, the NRDC provided significant funding in 1960 to a transistor-based computer development centre at Manchester University, which resulted in the creation of the Atlas computer that went into service in 1962, considered to be the world's most powerful computer at the time.]

Chaplin convinced the Schools Council to allow a trial period at selected schools for his proposed Electronic Systems A-level. The A-level was first trialled at the Colchester Royal Grammar School in Colchester, Essex, with the class successfully completing the course in 1975.^[18]^[19]

1979

Following a ten-year battle with the Schools Council, Chaplin's Electronic Systems A-level was finally approved by the Council for acceptance into the UK's broad national school curriculum. It is of special note that during Chaplin's representation on the National Electronics Council (NEC), he and the NEC's chairman at that time, Lord Mountbatten, developed a close working relationship, Lord Mountbatten proving to be a key ally in supporting the A-level's eventual acceptance into the UK's school curriculum.^[18]^[19]

Chaplin's help was requested following the Air New Zealand Mount Erebus disaster on 28th November 1979, when an Air New Zealand DC 10 airliner crashed into Mount Erebus in Antarctica with the loss of 257 lives. Chaplin and his team received the aircraft's black box and salvaged and analysed as much data from it as they could to aid the ongoing investigation.

1980s

Throughout the 1980s, Chaplin invented and developed technologies for the active cancellation of noise and vibration for numerous applications in localised and wide-area situations that we now take for granted, for instance, in noise cancellation headphones. The concept was revolutionary, Chaplin introducing the term “negative time”, and it was intelligent, in the sense that systems could adapt quickly to a changing noise or vibration environment in order to continually suppress it, and furthermore, the cancellation was selective, enabling wanted sound such as speech to easily be heard in the midst of extremely high-level noise environments. Applications included the cancellation of noise and vibration in ships, submarines, torpedoes, aircraft, land vehicles, electricity transformers, electricity generators and the cancellation of noise in factory environments. His various noise/vibration cancellation patents were subsequently licensed for numerous applications throughout the world.

With the increasing recognition of this new technology, it was felt that the pioneering nature of Chaplin's work at Essex University should be put on record. To this end, in 1983, Chaplin accepted invitations to write a number of explanatory papers, and to speak at several international conferences, which included the Journal of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects, the Proceedings of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects, and the Journal of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. Also, Chaplin was invited to join the Technical Committee for the 11th symposium of the International Congress on Acoustics (ICA), entitled “Active Absorption”, and he gave a plenary address at the Internoise ’83 Conference.

Interestingly, the eminent scientific “seer” and writer, Arthur C Clarke, heard about Chaplin's anti-sound work and wrote Chaplin a letter, saying that Clarke had some years previously written a short story about an anti-noise machine which a disgruntled member of a concert audience used to render an orchestral performance silent, adding mischievously that his story was proof that he had come up with the idea first! Of course, Clarke was very aware of the huge gulf between having a broad concept and then going on to develop the insights required to make that concept a reality; which was why Clarke was keen to invite Chaplin to his home in Sri Lanka to learn more about Chaplin's inventions, an offer that Chaplin was unable to take up at the time.

Chaplin realised that his techniques to reduce noise and vibration would have numerous applications in the military world, and consequently it was not surprising when the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) became very interested in his work. Chaplin consulted for the MoD on various applications using active sound and vibration cancellation, including submarines and torpedoes to reduce their sound and vibration signatures, and helicopter's rotor heads to reduce mechanical vibration and accordingly reduce noise signatures, as well as lengthening the life of airframes. He also proposed a solution using active vibration cancellation to nullify a vibration resonance problem that was significantly limiting the top speed of the Invincible Class of aircraft carrier ships that the Royal Navy had newly introduced into service at the time.

Chaplin also realised that the sonic synthesis techniques he had developed for his anti-noise projects could be used for a raft of other applications, including music synthesis. Particularly enjoying pipe organ music, he recognised that there would be a significant commercial market for a synthesised pipe organ that could emulate any of the great pipe organs of the world, but at a fraction of the cost of creation, installation, maintenance, and taking up comparatively little space. He had the foundation of a patent for musical instrument synthesis in mind for some time, but delayed lodging the patent as he was working on several other projects at the time that were taking his attention. Unfortunately, when he finally got around to submitting the patent, he found that the Allen Organ Company had just pipped him to the post.

Recognising that the demise of fossil fuel-burning engines was increasingly imminent in the light of fast depleting fossil fuel reserves and damaging global impact, Chaplin worked on developing lightweight batteries for electric traction vehicles, with improved energy capacity and power delivery.

1989

Retired.