Department of Commerce Announces
National Medal of Technology Awards
August 25, 2008. The Department of Commerce (DOC) announced the 2007 winners of the National Medal of Technology and Innovation (NMTI). See, release.
One half of these awards involve information technology. One winner is Paul Baran, for his joint invention of packet switched networks, while at the RAND Corporation, beginning in the 1960s.
Another is David Cutler, a software engineer who has long worked on operating systems for Microsoft.
Another winner is Grant Willson of the University of Texas at Austin, whose web site biography states that his work has focused on "the design and synthesis of functional organic materials with emphasis on materials for microelectronics".
Another NMTI award is for the eBay corporation.
The DOC also announced NMTI awards for Roscoe Brady, for his work on enzymatic defects in hereditary metabolic disorders, Armand Feigenbaum, for his work on economic relationship of quality costs, productivity improvement, and profitability, and Adam Heller, for his work in electrochemistry and bioelectrochemistry. Finally, the DOC awarded a NMT to the Skunk Works division of Lockheed, for its development of aircraft technology.
President Bush will present the NMTI winners with medals at a White House ceremony on September 29, 2008.
The NMTI program was instituted by the Stevenson-Wydler Technology Innovation Act of 1980. This was Public Law No. 96-180. It is now codified, along with amendments, at 15 U.S.C. § 3711.
The NMTI program is now administered by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
See also, TLJ coverage of awards in 2005, published in TLJ Daily E-Mail Alert No. 1,312, February 17, 2006.