7) Esaki's Outstanding Analogy
Picture A: Cover Page of April 1964 issue of
ｔhe Journal of the Institute of Electrical Communication Engineers of Japan
Picture B: "The Great Wave" from Hokusai's
thirty-six views of Mount Fuji which looks like indicating
the diode’s characteristics
Whenever I hear Esaki's speech, I always think he is outstanding
in his analogy.
In some round-table discussion meeting, he talked, "Japanese people often
compare with US only by the finished products, but this is not real competition.
In case of Olympic Game's race, runners run in the same racing track, and
the time difference between first and second runners are very small by only
a few seconds. But in the science and technology field, there is substantial
and qualitative difference. That means the first runner opens a road by himself
where no truck exists. The second runner just runs on the truck opened by
the first runner".
I show one more definitive example. April 1964 issue of the Journal of the
Institute of Electrical Communication Engineers of Japan carried the special
edition of Esaki Diode. Cover page shows the picture of so-called "The hump
of a camel" (picture A), but in the text, Esaki showed the famous "The Great
Wave” from Hokusai's thirty-six views of Mount Fuji (picture B) and added
the explanation.
On this diode's current–voltage characteristics, please refer to the Hokusai's
“The Great Wave off Kanagawa". It is interesting that this wonderful layout
of painting drawn in 200 years ago seems to be incidentally indicating the
diode characteristics. Negative resistance part is oscillating and Mount Fuji
is the bump by excess current.