Skip to main content
Robert W Lucky

Bob Lucky, an IEEE Life Fellow, died on March 10, 2022, at the age of 86. Dr. Lucky was a leader in the communications field, serving for several years as Executive Director of Communications Sciences Research Division, Bell Telephone Laboratories, and later Corporate Vice-President of Applied Research at Bellcore in Red Bank, New Jersey. Bob also served as IEEE Communications Society President during 1978-1979, and subsequently as Vice President of the IEEE Board of Directors, and editor of the IEEE Proceedings.

Robert W. Lucky was born on 9 January 1936 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and attended Purdue University, where he received the B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering in 1957, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in 1959 and 1961, respectively. After graduation, Lucky joined Bell Telephone Laboratories in Holmdel, New Jersey, where, initially, he was involved in studying ways of sending digital information over telephone lines. The best known outcome of this work was the most widely deployed implementation of an automatic adaptive equalizer, greatly increasing telephone channel capacities. The textbook on data communications which he co-authored became the most cited reference in the communications field over the period of a decade. His deep insights on technology and its human impacts came through in many witty and humorous talks and writings, which made him famous in the engineering community and beyond.

References:

  1. https://ethw.org/Robert_W._Lucky
  2. https://ethw.org/Oral-History:Robert_Lucky#Communications_theory.3B_adaptive_equalizers
  3. https://www.thompsonmemorial.net/obituaries/1787-dr-robert-w-lucky

Leave a comment or photo.

Comments