George E. Smith
While researching metal–oxide–semiconductor (MOS) technology, Willard Boyle and George E. Smith realized that an electric charge could be stored on a tiny MOS capacitor, which became the basic building block of the charge-couple device (CCD), which they invented in 1969. An issue with CCD technology was that it required the need for nearly perfect charge transfer, which, according to Eric Fossum, "makes their radiation 'soft,' difficult to use under low light conditions, difficult to manufacture in large array sizes, difficult to integrate with on-chip electronics, difficult to use at low temperatures, difficult to use at high frame rates, and difficult to manufacture in non-silicon materials that extend wavelength response."