Bob Metcalfe Receives 2022 ACM A.M. Turing Award
ACM recently named Bob Metcalfe as recipient of the 2022 ACM A.M. Turing Award for the invention, standardization, and commercialization of Ethernet.
From the ACM news release:
“Ethernet has been the dominant way of connecting computers to other devices, to each other, and to the Internet,” explains ACM President Yannis Ioannidis. “Metcalfe’s original design ideas have enabled the bandwidth of Ethernet to grow geometrically. It is rare to see a technology scale from its origins to today’s multigigabit-per-second capacity. Even with the advent of WiFi, Ethernet remains the staple mode of data communication, especially when security and reliability are prioritized. It is especially fitting to recognize such an impactful invention during its 50th anniversary year.”
Metcalfe is an Emeritus Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin and a Research Affiliate in Computational Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The ACM A.M. Turing Award is widely considered the “Nobel Prize of Computing,” and carries a $1 million prize with financial support provided by Google, Inc.
Metcalfe’s significant contributions to the development of Ethernet as a student in computer science have been noted previously by CRA as well. In 2009, CRA produced a paper on Landmark Contributions of Students in Computer Science (and CCC provided an update) which cited work on the foundational elements of Ethernet in Metcalfe’s Ph.D. dissertation.
