.Credit: Bank of England

June is LGBTQ+ Pride Month. All month long, Behind the Headlines will feature lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning pioneers in a variety of areas.

On what would have been his 109th birthday, the English mathematician, computer pioneer, and codebreaker Alan Turing is getting a very special gift: a 50-pound (£50) note. It’s not just an old £50 bank note, however. This bank note—and millions of others—will have his face on it.

Following a public nomination process in 2019, Turing was selected to be the new face of the £50 note. His image will replace images of the engineer and scientist James Watt and the industrialist and entrepreneur Matthew Boulton. An image of Elizabeth II will remain on the obverse side of the note, or the side that bears the principal design.

Turing was recognized not only for his important contributions to the development of electronic digital computers, but also for the discrimination he faced as a gay man. After World War II (1939-1945), Turing was prosecuted for his relationship with a man. He was given the choice of either imprisonment or probation with the condition of undergoing female hormone treatment. On June 7, 1954, at the age of 41, Turing took his own life.

In 2009, the British government issued an apology. Four years later, Turing was given a royal pardon, releasing him for the legal penalties for his crime. In 2017, the Turing Law was passed, which pardoned thousands of gay and bisexual men who had been convicted of sexual offenses that have since been eliminated.

Alan Turing (far right) was an English mathematician and computer pioneer. He made important contributions to the development of electronic digital computers.
Credit: Heritage-Images/Science Museum, London

Turing was born on June 23, 1912, in London. He studied mathematics at Cambridge University and Princeton University. In 1936, he developed a hypothetical computing machine—now called the Turing machine—that could, in principle, perform any calculation. The device had a long tape divided into squares on which symbols could be written or read. The tape head of the machine could move to the left or to the right. The machine also had a table to tell it the order in which to carry out operations. The Turing machine became an important model for determining what tasks a computer could perform. During World War II, Turing helped crack German codes.

After the war, he worked on a project to build the first British electronic digital computer. In 1950, he proposed a test for determining if machines might be said to “think.” This test, now called the Turing test, is often mentioned in discussions of artificial intelligence (AI).

June 22, 2018

On June 23, 1868, 150 years ago tomorrow, the United States Patent Office awarded patent no. 79,265 for the world’s first typewriter. The patent went to three inventors from Milwaukee, Wisconsin: Christopher Latham Sholes, Carlos Glidden, and Samuel W. Soulé. The typewriter revolutionized business and personal communication, allowing people to write with clarity, repetition, and speed. Typewriters, of course, no longer sit on most people’s desks. But the legacy of the typewriter lives on in the keyboards of computers and smart phones as well as in the skill of typing itself.

This model of the Sholes, Glidden, and Soulé type-writer was awarded a patent 150 years ago on June 23, 1868. Credit: Smithsonian Institution

In 1867, after much trial and error, inventor and journalist Christopher Sholes designed the first practical type-writing machine. He built the first model with the help of fellow inventors Carlos Glidden and Samuel Soulé. The patented machine of 1868 used piano keys which were used in conjunction with the adjustable knob on top to produce the 26 letters—in ALL CAPS—of the English alphabet. The machine was soon fitted with a more practical keyboard consisting of buttons assigned to each letter as well as punctuation marks and a space bar. New versions also used an upright carriage, allowing users to see the words on the page as they typed. In 1873, the rights to the type-writer were sold to E. Remington and Sons, a gun manufacturer that marketed and mass-produced the new machine.

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This drawing of the first typewriter accompanied the patent awarded in 1868. Credit: © Science Source

The earliest typewriters used keyboard layouts that had letters arranged alphabetically. These layouts enabled the typist to locate keys easily. However, a problem often occurred. When the typist struck in rapid succession two or more keys whose type bars were next to one another, the bars frequently jammed. To remedy this problem, Sholes helped develop another layout in the 1870′s. This layout, known as QWERTY, is still the standard for keyboards in most English- and Spanish-speaking countries. It is called QWERTY because the letters Q, W, E, R, T, and Y appear in succession near the upper left-hand corner of the keyboard. In the QWERTY layout, the bars for the letters that most often appear in combination in the English language are far apart.

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A computer keyboard includes all the keys found on a typewriter, shown here in pale blue, along with other keys or groupings of keys. The top row of letters gave the QWERTY layout its name. Credit: WORLD BOOK Illustration

Keyboards in some other countries have different layouts, maximizing the use of common letters in other languages. Many French-speaking countries use the AZERTY keyboard. Germany and many central European nations have QWERTZ keyboards, and alphabets that do not use Roman characters—Arabic or Chinese, for example—have their own individual typing layouts.

The first successful portable typewriter appeared in the early 1900′s. Electric typewriters came into use in the 1920′s. The first simple word processors, then often called automatic typewriters, came into the market during the early 1960′s. Manufacturers developed the electronic typewriter during the late 1970′s. Beginning about 1980, personal computers and printers began to replace typewriters for home and office use.

April 5, 2018

It can be easy to forget how much computer innovations have changed and improved our everyday lives over the years. A person living 100 years ago would scarcely be able to imagine sending a message directly to someone on the opposite side of the globe with just the click of a button or having access to an entire encyclopedia of information from a small handheld device. We have these and many more luxuries thanks to several decades of computing innovations. Fifty years ago, the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) in New York City introduced the annual A. M. Turing Award to honor the hardworking computer scientists behind those innovations.

Alan M. Turing (at right) was an English mathematician and computer pioneer. He made important contributions to the development of electronic digital computers.
Credit: Heritage-Images/Science Museum, London

The A. M. Turing Award is given to one or more individuals each year in recognition of contributions of lasting importance in the field of computing. On March 21, 2018, the American computer scientists David A. Patterson and John L. Hennessy were named the recipients of the 2017 A. M. Turing Award for their pioneering work in computer chip design. The two men are responsible for designing and promoting reduced instruction set computer (RISC) microprocessors. A microprocessor is a kind of computer chip that carries out the instructions that make up computer programs. RISC microprocessors are simplified computer chips that run faster and consume less power than other kinds of chips.

David A. Patterson. Credit: © UC Berkeley

Patterson proposed the idea for a RISC computer in 1980. He and his research team at the University of California in Berkeley built and demonstrated the first RISC processor in 1982. Hennessy’s research team at Stanford University in California developed further RISC models shortly thereafter. In 1990, Patterson and Hennessy co-wrote a groundbreaking textbook on microprocessor design. The book, called Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach, became a standard text for engineering computer chips. Today, about 99 percent of all microprocessors produced annually are RISC processors. RISC chips are found in almost every smartphone and tablet.

John L. Hennessy. Credit: Eric Chan (licensed under CC BY 2.0)

The A. M. Turing Award is named after Alan Mathison Turing, a British mathematician and computer pioneer. Turing made key contributions to the development of electronic computers, including his work helping to build the first British electronic digital computer. In 1950, he proposed a test for determining if machines might be said to “think.” This test, now called the Turing test, is still central to discussions of artificial intelligence.

The first Turing Award was given to the American computer scientist Alan J. Perlis in 1966 for his role in developing influential computer-programming techniques. Since then, an award has been given every year. As of 2014, the award includes a $1 million cash prize.

September 30, 2015

An international team of scientists reported this week on new discoveries recovered from the Antikythera shipwreck, a mysterious 2,100-year-old Roman-era wreck that also contains the world’s oldest-known computer. The scientists displayed more than 50 items recovered from the ship in recent months, including an ivory flute, fine glassware, ceramic amphorae (wine jugs), and a bronze armrest. The artifacts provide a rare glimpse into the material wealth of the most elite members of society in ancient Rome and the surprising technological sophistication of the ancient world.

Archaeologists excavating the famous ancient Greek shipwreck that yielded the Antikythera Mechanism have recovered more than 50 items, including an intact amphora; a large lead salvage ring, two lead anchor stocks (possibly indicating the ship’s bow), fragments of lead hull sheathing, and a small and finely formed lagynos (or table jug). (Credit: Brett Seymour, EUA/ARGO/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute)

In 1900, sponge divers first discovered the ancient shipwreck beneath about 180 feet (55 meters) of water near Antikythera, an island off the southern coast of Greece. One of the most fascinating artifacts (objects made by human skill or work, especially tools or weapons) recovered in 1900 is known as the Antikythera Mechanism. The mechanism has 30 hand-cut bronze gears, dials, clock-like hands, and a wooden and bronze casing inscribed with ancient Greek writing. Scientists tried for decades to understand its purpose. In 2006, using computed tomography (CT) imaging, scientists made out faded inscriptions and reconstructed the mechanism. The reconstruction showed that it was an accurate mechanical astronomical computer that could predict the position of the sun and planets. It was also able to forecast lunar and solar eclipses. The finding showed that ancient technology was much more advanced than scientists had previously imagined.

Beginning in 2014, an international team of archaeologists renewed exploration of the Antikythera shipwreck for the first time in 40 years. Dozens of marble statues had been recovered from the shipwreck in the past, but scientists knew that many valuable artifacts remained. The shipwreck is scattered over an area 100 feet (30 meters) in diameter. Using modern methods developed for underwater archaeology, scientists investigated the shipwreck, recovered artifacts, and tried to reconstruct the ship’s history. Robotic submersibles (undersea research vessels) mapped the wreckage in great detail, and metal detectors located objects beneath the sandy seafloor.

Researchers think the Antikythera ship sank in a storm around 65 B.C., while transporting treasure from Greece to Rome. The treasure may have been taken as booty during a military campaign in Greece by Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix. Unlike other ancient shipwrecks, which often provide artifacts from common daily life, this ship held treasures that represent the finest artwork and luxury goods available only to the wealthiest members of ancient society.

The smallest working transistor ever made has been created by a team of Australian and American physicists from a single atom of phosphorus. A transistor is a tiny device that controls the flow of electric current in radios, television sets, computers, and almost every other kind of electronic equipment. By switching between “on” and “off,” transistors physically simulate the 1′s and 0′s that represent digital information. Like the transistors used in virtually all modern computer chips, the atom-sized transistor was etched into a crystal of silicon. However, significant additional development is needed before a single-atom transistor could be used in practical microprocessors because it requires temperatures well below freezing.

Since the 1960′s, chipmakers have managed to shrink transistors in half roughly once every 18 months–a trend known as Moore’s law. Microprocessors from the 1970′s had a few thousand transistors.  Modern fingernail-sized computer chips may contain billions of microscopic transistors. Such transistors may be less than a hundred atoms thick.

Hundreds of millions of transistors are built into microprocessors, which carry out the instructions that make up computer programs. Microprocessors are manufactured in a grid pattern on a silicon wafer, as seen in this photograph. Intel Corporation

However, transistors and other computer components can only shrink so far–namely, to the size of an atom. Transistors work by switching electric current on and off. An electric current consists of a flow of electrons–negatively charged subatomic particles that move from atom to atom. Building a transistor from electrons would be impossible for much the same reason that building a faucet from water molecules would be impossible.

If Moore’s law holds, computer chip transistors will reach the atomic-scale limit within a few decades. Scientists believe that radically different designs are necessary to shrink computer components smaller than the atomic scale.

Additional World Book articles:

• A Look Back at Computers (A Special Report)
• Bardeen, John
• Computing with Molecules (A Special Report)
• Schrieffer, John Robert
• Shockley, William