JD Albert
{{short description|American engineer, inventor, and educator}}
JD Albert (born April 18, 1975) is an American engineer, inventor, and educator. Albert is one of the inventors of microencapsulated electrophoretic display (known as E Ink) commonly used in electronic devices such as e-readers.{{cite journal|last1=Comiskey|first1=Barrett|title=An electrophoretic ink for all-printed reflective electronic displays|journal=Nature|volume=394|date=18 May 1998|issue=6690|pages=253–255|doi=10.1038/28349|bibcode=1998Natur.394..253C |s2cid=204998708 }}
In 2016 Albert became one of the youngest inventors ever inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.{{Cite web|url=http://www.bresslergroup.com/news/jd-albert-named-2016-inductee-of-national-inventors-hall-of-fame/|title=JD Albert in Inventors Hall of Fame {{!}} Bresslergroup News|work=Bresslergroup |language=en-US|access-date=2016-09-01}} Albert is named on over 100 US patents.{{cite web|url=http://www.jdalbert.com/#new-page|website=jdalbert.com|title=jdalbert.com|accessdate=2017-03-11}} He teaches product development in the University of Pennsylvania's Integrated Product Design (IPD) program.{{cite web|title=JD Albert|url=https://ipd.me.upenn.edu/faculty/|website=ipd.me.upenn.edu}}
Career
Along with Barrett Comiskey, he developed the E Ink display. The two invented E Ink while they were undergraduates at MIT. MIT Media Lab professor Joseph Jacobson recruited them to create a technology that mimicked pages in a book.{{cite web|last1=Primozic|first1=Ursa|title=Interview with Barrett Comiskey|url=https://www.visionect.com/blog/interview-with-barrett-comiskey/|website=visionect.com|date=27 May 2016 |accessdate=11 March 2017}} As Albert told Science Friday,{{Cite web|url=http://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/how-electronic-ink-was-invented/|title=How Electronic Ink Was Invented - Science Friday|language=en-US|access-date=2016-09-01}} "It was ... experimental discovery. ... We had ideas, we were doing a lot of research, reading a lot of patents — many of which were expired patents — recreating experiments, and really, truly forging ahead to make this thing work. It involved a lot of prototypes, and it involved a huge amount of failed experiments." In 1997, after a year of research and experimentation, Comiskey and fellow MIT undergraduate JD Albert realized a working prototype.
In 1997, Albert, Comiskey and Jacobson along with Russ Wilcox and Jerome Rubin founded E Ink Corporation.{{cite news|last1=Klein|first1=Alec|title=A New Printing Technology Sets Off a High-Stakes Race|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB946939872703897050|newspaper=Wall Street Journal|date=4 January 2000 |accessdate=14 March 2017}}
Albert contributed a chapter on design thinking for early-stage startups to the book Design Thinking: New Product Development Essentials from the PDMA.{{Cite book|title=Design Thinking: New Product Development Essentials from the PDMA|last1=Luchs|first1=Michael G.|last2=Swan|first2=Scott|last3=Griffin|first3=Abbie|date=2015-11-02|publisher=Wiley-Blackwell|isbn=9781118971802|edition=1|language=English}} He has also contributed articles about product development to Entrepreneur{{Cite web|url=https://www.entrepreneur.com/author/jd-albert|title=JD Albert|last=Albert|first=JD|website=Entrepreneur|access-date=2016-09-01}} and Wired.{{Cite magazine|url=https://www.wired.com/insights/2015/01/hackathons-for-hardware-innovation/|title=Not Just for Coders: Hackathons for Hardware Innovation|last=Bresslergroup|first=JD Albert|magazine=Wired |date=13 January 2015 |language=en-US|access-date=2016-09-01}}
Personal life and education
Albert has a Bachelor's of Science in Mechanical Engineering{{Cite web |last= |first= |date= |title=LinkedIn |url=https://www.linkedin.com/in/jd-albert-8647a2 |access-date= |website=}} from MIT. He lives in Philadelphia.
References
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Category:MIT School of Engineering alumni