Zworykin, Vladimir Kosma

Zworykin, Vladimir Kosma (zwô`rĭkĭn), 1889–1982, American physicist, b. Russia, educated in Russia, at the Collège de France, and at the Univ. of Pittsburgh (Ph.D., 1926). He became an American citizen in 1924. On the staff of the Radio Corp. of America after 1929, he became vice president and technical consultant of the corporation in 1947 and honorary vice president and consultant in 1954. In recognition of his many achievements he was awarded the National Medal of Science in 1967. His important researches in electronics enabled him to develop with his coworkers the iconoscope, a scanning tube for the television camera, and the kinescope, a cathode-ray tube in the television receiving apparatus. A group under his direction produced (1939) an electron microscope. Zworykin is coauthor of Photocells and Their Application (1930, rev. ed. 1934), Television (1940), Electron Optics and the Electron Microscope (1945), Photoelectricity and Its Application (1949), and Television in Science and Industry (1958).