Author: Kálmán Tarnay
Born: 6 November 1929
Died: 15 December 1998
Bio: Kálmán Tarnay was born on 6 November 1929 in Nyiregyháza, Hungary. He graduated Budapest Technical University (BTU) in 1952, was awarded a University Doctor's (Master's) degree (1961) and a Ph.D. degree (1966) both in BTU. He joined the BTU Department of Electron Devices, where he remained until his death from the post of Full Professor in 1998. Between 1975 and 1983 he acted as Head of the Department. Prof. Tarnay was the Fellow of IEEE. He was an Honorary Professor at the Uppsala University and the Foreign Member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Art.

Kálmán Tarnay was a most distinguished engineer and a leader in the field of microelectronics and electronics design in Hungary. The theory of tunnel diode developed by him in early sixties gave the general explanation of underlying physics principles of such devices. The simulation packages PN-Junction, TRANZ-TRAN and STEP were strong competitors to such worldwide well-known packages as SPICE and SUPREM. He introduced the pioneering activity in the field of alpha-particle stimulated avalanche processes in nano-metric MOS structures, reached in the last decade of this millennium in 3D Monte-Carlo method based modelling and simulation.

Kálmán Tarnay was an inspired teacher and gathered many post-graduate students and research workers around him. He was constantly active in the organization of international scientific meetings. Kálmán Tarnay was the author or editor of numerous books on the microelectronics and electronics design related topics.

Kálmán Tarnay was a sought-after lecturer and welcome visitor at many international institutions. He is particularly remembered at Uppsala University, Helsinki University of Technology, Dresden Technical University, Tallinn Technical University and Kiev Polytechnic Institute. He was a strong supporter of Hungarian-Estonian-Finnish cooperation in the field of Information Technology. Kálmán Tarnay was one of the initiators of idea to bring the Baltic Electronics Conference on the international level.