Thompson, Richard A. 1942-

PERSONAL:

Born April 6, 1942. Education: Lafayette College, B.S.; Columbia University, M.S.; University of Connecticut, Ph.D.

ADDRESSES:

Office—School of Information, University of Pittsburgh, 135 N. Bellefield Ave., Pittsburgh, PA 15260; fax:412-624-5231. E-mail—rat@tele.pitt.edu.

CAREER:

Academic and author. University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, professor of telecommunications, 1989—, chair of the Telecommunications Program, secondary appointment in the electrical engineering department, affiliated with the undergraduate photonics program. Formerly employed by Bell Labs for twenty years, and Litton Industries. Chair of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Communications Society's Technical Committee on Switching and Routing.

WRITINGS:

Telephone Switching Systems, Artech House (Boston, MA), 2000.

(With David Tipper, Joeseph Kabara, Prashant Krishnamurthy, and Sujata Banerjee) The Physical Layer of Communications Systems, Artech House (Boston, MA), 2006.

Author of numerous research publications for Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers journals and conferences.

SIDELIGHTS:

Richard A. Thompson was born on April 6, 1942. He received his B.S. in electrical engineering from Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, his M.S. in electrical engineering from Columbia University in New York City, and his Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Connecticut in Hartford. He worked at Litton Industries, then at Bell Labs for twenty years. In 1989 he became a professor of telecommunications at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania and is the chair of the telecommunications department. He also teaches in the electrical engineering department and is an affiliate of the undergraduate photonics program. He was the chair of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Communications Society's Technical Committee on Switching and Routing, an organization whose purpose is to advance the state of the art in theory and applications of information switching and networking. His primary interests are in the interaction between computers and people and in the statistical analysis of interacting wave packets. His expertise is in the use of photons as switches to route information onto separate paths in communication networks and in the technology that allows vocal transmission on the Internet.

Thompson's book Telephone Switching Systems presents a comprehensive picture of how switching systems are structured. A reviewer writing on Bookpool.com called it "the definitive Bible on the architectures of the systems that provide telephone service." In the book Thompson gives detailed descriptions of both the hardware and software of six different telephone systems, four of them in common use around the United States and two used universally worldwide. He provides complete information on the history of the switching systems, explains how their history has impacted the regulation of those systems, and shows how modern computer application software and the requirements of customer service affect the current application of switching systems. He covers analog and digital systems and explains the groundwork for voice over IP, the technology that allows vocal transmission on the Internet. Thompson also discusses how telephones operate, how transmissions work, and the intricacies of human interaction with telephone systems.

Thompson is also the principal author of The Physical Layer of Communications Systems. Written as a reference manual for telecommunications engineers, the book discusses in detail how networks transmit information, explaining standard protocols for networking and describing the physics of copper cables, optical fibers, and wireless networks. The book gives an overview of system design and architecture, illustrating how all the elements—hardware, software, circuits, and methodology—work together to transmit information. It also gives troubleshooting advice to technicians in pursuit of fast, efficient, and reliable transmissions. A reviewer writing on the Seekbooks Web site acknowledged The Physical Layer of Communications Systems as "essential reading for telecommunications engineers at all levels."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

IEEE Communications, June 1, 2001, Wojciech Kabacinski, review of Telephone Switching Systems, p. 20.

SciTech Book News, September 1, 2000, review of Telephone Switching Systems, p. 135.

ONLINE

Bookpool.com,http://www.bookpool.com/ (July 30, 2008), review of Telephone Switching Systems and short author biography.

Seekbooks,http://www.seekbooks.com.au/ (July 30, 2008), review of The Physical Layer of Communications Systems.

University of Pittsburgh, Computer Science Department Web site,http://www.cs.pitt.edu/ (July 30, 2008), author profile.

University of Pittsburgh, School of Information Sciences Web site,http://www.ischool.pitt.edu/ (July 30, 2008), author profile.