{"product_id":"from-insight-to-innovation-isbn-9780262044301","title":"From Insight to Innovation","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe engineering ideas behind key twentieth-century technical innovations, from great dams and highways to the jet engine, the transistor, the microchip, and the computer.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003eTechnology is essential to modern life, yet few of us are technology-literate enough to know much about the engineering that underpins it. In this book, David P. Billington, Jr., offers accessible accounts of the key twentieth-century engineering innovations that brought us into the twenty-first century. Billington examines a series of engineering advances—from Hoover Dam and jet engines to the transistor, the microchip, the computer, and the internet—and explains how they came about and how they work.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEach of these innovations tells a unique story. The great dams of the New Deal brought huge rivers under control, and a national highway system interconnected the nation, as did jet air travel. The transistor and the microchip originated in the private sector and found a mass market after early government support. The computer and the internet began as government projects and found a mass market later in the private sector. Billington finds that engineers with unconventional insights could succeed in a bureaucratic age; what mattered were independent vision and a society that welcomed innovation.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis book completes the story of American engineering begun with the earlier volumes \u003ci\u003eThe Innovators\u003c\/i\u003e (by the author's father) and \u003ci\u003ePower, Speed, and Form\u003c\/i\u003e (by the author and his father).\u003c\/p\u003e1. Rivers   and Regions: The Age of Frank Crowe    ...........................      11\u003cbr\u003e 2. Morgan, Lilienthal, and the Tennessee Valley Authority  ................    47\u003cbr\u003e 3. Highways and Skyscrapers: MacDonald and Khan  ......................    81\u003cbr\u003e 4. Rickover and Nuclear Power    ................................................  119\u003cbr\u003e 5. The Jet Engine and the Rocket: Whittle, Goddard, and NASA  ........    143\u003cbr\u003e 6. Bardeen and the Transistor    .................................................  179\u003cbr\u003e 7. Kilby, Noyce, and the Microchip    ..........................................  207\u003cbr\u003e 8. The Computer and the Internet: The Age of Steve Jobs  ...............  235David P. Billington, Jr., is a historian and author of books and articles exploring the history of engineering innovation.","brand":"The MIT Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46304620609765,"sku":"NP9780262044301","price":34.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780262044301.jpg?v=1767727738","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/from-insight-to-innovation-isbn-9780262044301","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}