Terahertz Plasmonic Technology
2021
Vol. 21, No. 11
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Professor Michael Shur was born on November 13, 1942, in the town of Kamensk-Uralsky, Sverdlovsk Oblast, USSR. In 1965 he graduated from the Electrotechnical Institute in Leningrad (presently St. Petersburg), USSR, with the Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering. Just two years later, in 1967, he received his Ph.D. degree in Physics from the world-known A.F. Ioffe Physical-Technical Institute of the USSR National Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg. Thereafter, from 1968 to 1976, he stayed at the A.F. Ioffe Institute as a Junior Researcher and later Senior Fellow Researcher.
By the year 1973 Dr. Shur had a ready-to-defend dissertation for the Doctor of Science degree - the highest habitation degree in Russia usually bestowed on well-established scientists for fundamental work in science. The dissertation's title was, "The Theory of the Gunn Effect and Plasma Waves in Semiconductors". At this point a strange story unfolded that has interfered with and changed rather dramatically Michael Shur's further life and career in science. It so happened that at about the same time a cousin of his, together with about a dozen Soviet Jews denied permission to emigrate to Israel, were arrested for trying to hijack a small passenger aircraft in order to flee the USSR, starting the famous in the West "aircraft hijackers" court case. Though Michael had nothing to do with the story, he was told in no unclear terms by his Institute’s administration that unless he denounced his cousin’s actions publicly, he would not be allowed to defend his Dr.S. dissertation. Michael refused.
Three years later, in 1976, the Shur family, by then with two pre-school daughters, had emigrated to the United States. The Doctor of Science degree story became family history (after all, this degree is not common in the US), Michael's career was flourishing in the US - except, as fate would have it, sometime in the late 1980s Dr. Z. Alferov, a world-known physicist, future Nobel Prize laureate and then-president of the A.F. Ioffe Institute, happened to attend a science conference in the US, of which Michael Shur was one of the organizers. They met, and Dr. Alferov said - times changed, it should be possible and would be only fair for Michael to defend his great 1973 dissertation and get his long-deserved Doctor of Science degree. For this Michael had to fly to St. Petersburg - the formal defense took place in 1992, 20 years after the work was completed and presented for defense.
Back to 1976: Michael Shur, his wife Paulina and their two young daughters had arrived in the United States as political refugees (no citizenship in any country, no jobs…), unfolding a career typical for the Soviet immigrant scientist completely unaware of the Western academic standards, traditions, and expectations. After a few short stints in American research institutions (1976-1978, Research Associate and Assistant Professor at Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan; 1978-79, Assistant Professor at Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan; 1979, visiting researcher at Cornell University and IBM TJ Watson Research Center), all the while producing solid results and a string of publications in science journals on semiconductor physics, Michael eventually settled in a permanent full-time academic position of Associate Professor and later Full Professor at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, 1979-1989.
In 1989-1996 Michael Shur was at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, as John Marshall Money Professor of Electrical Engineering and Director of the Applied Electrophysics Laboratories. His next and last stretch, 1996-2025, was at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), Troy NY, as Patricia and Sheldon Roberts Professor of Solid State Electronics, Professor of Physics, Applied Physics, and Astronomy, Acting Director of the Center for Integrated Electronics, Director of RPI site "CONNECTION ONE" of NSF I/UCRC. Having formally retired from his tenured position in 2025, Michael remained at RPI as Research Professor, leading his lab and its team straight till his death.
Research requires resources. Over the years, Dr. Shur had received over 150 grants and contracts from agencies and companies NSF, ARO, ONR, AFOSR, ARPA, NATO, NRL, SET, Crystal IS, Honeywell, McDonnell Douglas, Ford Microelectronics, Control Data Corporation, M/A COM, Bell Core, IBM, Microelectronics and Information Sciences Center, Supercomputer Institute, VCIT, GE, Motorola, NASA, and other agencies.
Dr. Shur's remarkable career in science covered diverse fields - semiconductor devices, solid-state physics and engineering, plasma wave electronics, thin film transistors, laser technology, sub-micrometer field effect transistors, terahertz technology, acoustics, and acousto-optic devices. With well over 1,000 technical publications to his credit, the Institute for Scientific Information, an organization that tracks citations, lists him as one of the most quoted researchers in his field. He also authored, co-authored, and edited 32 books. According to Wikipedia, as of 2022 Dr. Shur held 375 patents for a wide variety of microelectronic innovations.
Here are some examples of his many achievements in science and in particular the area of sensors. Dr. Shur was first to propose, in 1969, using the Moss-Burstein effect for measurements of electric temperature (M. S. Shur, Phys. Lett. 29A, No. 9, 490, 1969). Jointly with his Ioffe Institute colleagues he invented and patented an electro-optic field probe (Sov. Phys. Semicond. Vol. 5, No. 11, pp. 1933-1935, 1971) that became a standard for electric field sensors. He was a co-inventor of a Gated Transmission Line pattern (US Patent # 4,638,341, 1987). His likely best known achievement in the field of sensors was development of a new generation of plasma wave detectors of terahertz radiation (Jou. of Nanoelectronics and Optoelectronics, Vol. 2, No, 3, Dec. 2007. This work, in turn, was based on his prediction back in late 1970s of the ballistic transport (jointly with Les Eastman, IEEE Trans. Electron Devices, Vol. ED-26, No. 11, Nov. 1979), which opened a new field of research in nanoscale transistors. In the 1990's Dr. Shur jointly with Prof. Dyakonov had pioneered plasma wave electronics (Phys. Rev. Lett. Vol. 71, No. 15, Oct. 1993). Much of today’s work on THz sensors is based on those ideas, with the potential for using terahertz electronics sensor technology in areas from homeland security to medical imaging to cancer diagnostics. The 1999 NSF-DARPA Sensitive Skin Workshop that Prof. Shur co-chaired with Profs. V. Lumelsky and S. Wagner, and their followup book (Series Selected Topics in Electronics and Systems, World Scientific, 2000) has opened a new direction in sensing, design and applications of (potentially multi-million-sensors) extra-large sensing sheets.
Dr. Shur was deeply dedicated to his students and took great pride in helping and watching their successful careers in academia, industry, and entrepreneurship. His impact on the many students and researchers that he mentored, professional societies he was a member of, and the broader engineering profession will long be remembered.
This IEEE Sensors Council (SC) is proud of Dr. Shur’s many years of active involvement in SC activities and leadership. Over the years he has been Sensors Council's Vice President (VP) for Publications (2002-2003, 2006-2007); VP-Conferences (2012-2013); VP-Technical Operations (2008-2009, 2010 - 2011); Co-Chair of IEEE SENSORS Conference Technical Committee (2002); SC Distinguished Lecturer (2016-2018); Chair of SC Fellows Committee (2012-2013); Chair of SC Meeting Committee (2013). His many tutorials in conjunction with the IEEE SENSORS Conference were always expected and well attended.
Michael Shur was the founder and co-founder of a number of startup companies, including as President and CEO of Electronics of the Future, Inc., and President of Sensor Electronics Technology, Inc. The company Sensor Electronics Technology, Inc. (www.s-et.com), co-founded by Michael Shur, is today the only commercial supplier of deep UV LEDs worldwide (Proc. SPIE 6894, 689419, 2008), and was cited by DARPA as a “success story” in applying UV LEDs for detection of biological hazardous agents.
Dr. Shur was a Life Fellow of IEEE, APS, ECS, and SPIE; Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, AAAS, OSA, IET, MRS, and other professional societies; and a recipient of numerous national and international honors recognizing his contributions to research, innovation, education, and technology commercialization. Here are some:
Dr. Shur served as Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of High Speed Electronics and Systems, as member of editorial boards of various science journals, and as Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Book Series on Special Topics in Electronics and Systems.
His boundless energy was well known among friends and colleagues: up early in the morning for a run or swim (still better if snorkeling available), always ready for philosophical musings or whimsical chats and long walks with friends, for visits to concerts and museum. You could see him at a chessboard, at a ping-pong table, at a Scrabble board - nearly always winning. Known for his dry wit and good humor, he maintained his spirits and the spirits of those around him to the end.
He left behind his wife of nearly 60 years Paulina, and daughters Luba and Natasha.
Professor Michael Shur died on June 5, 2026, at the age of 83, in Vienna, Virginia.
His impact on the many students and researchers he mentored, the professional societies he served, and the broader engineering profession will long be remembered.
Professor Michael Shur touched the lives of countless students, researchers, colleagues, and members of the global engineering community. We invite you to share your memories, reflections, and stories as we celebrate his remarkable life and lasting legacy.
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