11 Things you should know about the Indian Origin Engineer who got Russia’s Top Tech Award

He has been awarded Russia’s highest tech award. He was also awarded America’s highest engineering prize in 2011. His invention has saved around $24 Trillion by raising efficiency of digital equipment. Know more about the incredible B. Jayant Baliga.

B. Jayant Baliga, a US-based Indian scientist, has been awarded Russia’s top technology award in recognition of his work in energy management by Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday.

Baliga’s incredible work that led to a major development in energy management brought about a huge increase in efficiency and major savings.

Here are 11 awesome things you need to know about him –

1. While working at the General Electrical research & development centre in New York, he had invented the digital switch or the insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) in 1980 which switches energy hundreds of thousands of times a second, resulting in a multi-fold increase in the efficiency of all digital equipment and computer hardware.

Source: asiancorrespondent.com

2. Baliga claims that his invention, which combines the two streams of Electronics and Electrical engineering, has probably saved around 24 trillion dollars by raising the efficiency of such equipment.

Photo: theinstitute.ieee.org

3. He also says that every motor today is at least 40 percent more efficient, the CFL is 75 percent better and a motor vehicle saves over 10 percent fuel because of his invention.

Photo: www.chipestimate.com

4. He did not get any money out of his invention but he says he did it all for humanity.

Photo: http://www.chipestimate.com

5. He has written 19 books and over 500 papers in peer-reviewed journals.

Photo: www.rwth-aachen.de

6. Baliga is a graduate of IIT-Madras and did his MS and PhD from the US in Electrical Engineering, after which he joined GE where he spent over 15 years.

Photo: YouTube

7. Several colleagues told him that his invention would not work, but he stood by his conviction and eventually it did become successful.

Photo: www.engr.ncsu.edu

8. When scientists ask him why doesn’t India recognize his work, he says perhaps they don’t know what I did.

Photo: spectrum.ieee.org

9. Scientific American magazine included him among the ‘eight heroes of the semi-conductor revolution’.

10. President Barack Obama awarded him with the highest recognition given to an engineer by the United States government, the National Medal of Technology and Innovation, in October 2011.

Photo: www.uspto.gov

11. He is the 2014 recipient of the IEEE Medal of Honour.

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