Lynn Conway

Lynn Conway is
a famed pioneer of microelectronics chip design. Her innovations
during the 1970's at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) have
impacted chip design worldwide. Many high-tech companies and
computing methods have foundations in her work.

Lynn received
her B.S. and M.S.E.E. degrees from Columbia University in 1962 and
1963. She began her career at IBM Research at Yorktown Heights, NY,
in 1964, moving on later to work at Memorex Corporation, at the
Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), and at the Defense Advanced
Research Project's Agency (DARPA). Concurrent with her work at Xerox
PARC, she served as Visiting Associate Professor of EECS at M.I.T.
in 1978-79. She joined the University of Michigan in 1985 as
Professor of EECS and Associate Dean of the College of Engineering.

Thousands of
chip designers learned their craft from Lynn's book, Introduction to
VLSI Systems, which she co-authored with Professor Carver Mead of
Caltech. Thousands more did their first VLSI design projects using
the government's MOSIS prototyping system, which is based directly
on Lynn's work at PARC. Much of the modern silicon chip design
revolution is based on her work.

By successfully
simplifying and demystifying the previously extremely complex

process of silicon chip design, the work of the Mead-Conway team
was largely responsible for the rapid progress in VLSI chip design
and design tools in the 80's. Taken together, Lynn's many diverse
contributions to computer architecture, VLSI design and
internet-based chip-prototyping have greatly enhanced later progress
in microelectronics, computing and information technology.
Lynn
went on to win many awards and high honors, including election as a
Member of the National Academy of Engineering, the highest
professional recognition an engineer can receive.

What no one
knew until recently is that Lynn also did earlier pioneering
research at IBM in the 60's. Fresh out of graduate school, she
invented a powerful method for issuing multiple out-of-order
instructions per machine cycle in supercomputers. By solving this
fundamental computer architecture problem back in 1965, she enabled
creation of the first true superscalar computer, and participated in
its design. Lynn called her invention dynamic instruction scheduling
(DIS).

By the 90's,
chips held enough transistors so that entire superscalar computers
could be put on single chips. Lynn's DIS invention suddenly became
used in almost all the powerful new PC chips, making them much more
powerful than they would otherwise have been. Lynn's work thus had
yet another very major impact on the modern information technology
revolution.

Most
researchers thought DIS was a generalization of decades of work,
having no idea it had been invented in 1965. It caused Lynn great
angst to see her wonderful invention so widely used and described in
all the computer architecture textbooks, without anyone knowing it
was her idea.

How could this
oversight have happened? Why did Lynn remain silent for over three
decades about her important IBM work? The reason is that IBM had
terminated Lynn's promising young research career in 1968, firing
her after learning that she was undergoing transsexual transition
from male to female. She had then gone outside the U.S. to complete
her transition, come back and started her life all over
again.

After
completing her gender transition in 1968, Lynn took a new name and
identity and then restarted her technical career at the bottom of
the ladder, as a newly-hired contract programmer at Computer
Applications, Inc. Ever so happy and fulfilled in her new life,
Lynn's new career blossomed. She went on to work at Memorex
Corporation during 1969-72, and rapidly climbed back up the ladder
as a digital system designer and then as a computer architect.

While at Memorex, Lynn quickly established a promising new
professional identity as a successful woman engineer. She did this
while in "stealth mode" - i.e., without people knowing of her
past.

During those
early pioneering years of gender transition, Lynn had to keep her
past a secret just to survive, much less build a career. It was a
scary time, because any "outings" could well have ended her new
career and seriously threatened her chances for a productive and
fulfilling life.

Lynn was
successful in this effort, moving on to join the Xerox Palo Alto
Research Center (PARC) in 1973 where she did her creative VLSI
systems work, and the rest is history.

Lynn's
innovations in VLSI design were of strategic significance not only
in the commercial sector, but also in the defense industry. As a
result, she was recruited in the early 80's by the Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency (DARPA). At DARPA she became a key
technical architect and leader of planning of the DoD's "Strategic
Computing Initiative" (SCI), serving in DoD's Senior Executive
Service as Assistant Director for Strategic Computing at DARPA.

In order for
Lynn to enter this assignment, her past had to be quietly and
secretly vetted by the Defense Investigative Service (DIS). Unlike
the frequent firings and employer rejections of individuals known to
have transitioned in the civilian sector at the time, Lynn was able
to obtain the required approvals and Top Secret clearance, and thus
move into her new position at DARPA.

SCI was a major
program in high-performance computing, machine intelligence,
autonomous systems and intelligent weapons technologies created to
forestall Soviet aims during the height of the Cold War. Reporting
to Dr. Robert Cooper, Director of DARPA and Assistant Secretary of
Defense, Lynn led the effort that produced the Strategic Computing
Plan in November 1983, and then went on to guide the program during
its formative years.

Outgrowths of
SCI research include new paradigms in intelligent systems that now
help to underpin modern defense technology, especially in areas such
as battle-management systems, intelligent weapons and autonomous
land, sea and air vehicles.

In 1985, Ms.
Conway was recruited by the University of Michigan as Professor of
EECS and Associate Dean of Engineering. There she contributed to
many research and educational initiatives during the period of rapid
expansion of the College of Engineering onto the University's North
Campus in the 1980's and 90's. Lynn's research work at Michigan
focused on visual communications and control, and she has received
five U.S. Patents for visual communications and control
inventions.
Lynn retired from active faculty status in December
1998 as Professor of EECS, Emerita. She lives with her husband
Charlie (also an engineer) and their four cats, on a 23 acre
homestead in rural Michigan out to the west of Ann Arbor. Charlie
and Lynn enjoy sharing many interests and pastimes, and have been
together for over 17 years now.

By 1999,
computer historians searching for the origins of DIS were becoming
aware of Lynn's early innovative work at IBM. Facing a difficult
choice of what to do after 31 long years of living in stealth, Lynn
gradually and quietly began "coming out". She began by using her
website to inform colleagues, hoping to tell her story in her own
words rather than have it just spill out.

Lynn's story
became increasingly widely read over the following years, and her
website, http://www.lynnconway.com, has gradually evolved into a
heavily-accessed, highly-respected informational site on the topics
of transgenderism, transsexualism and gender transition.

Lynn has also
consulted with a number of high-tech firms on equal opportunity
hiring and employment protections for transgender and transsexual
workers, sensing that many of these companies are highly committed
to diversity and inclusiveness and thus are receptive to ensuring
their policies reflect that commitment. Many high-tech firms have
already adopted such protections, including major firms such as
Apple, HP, Intel, Kodak, Lucent, NCR, Verizon Wireless, Xerox and
yes - even IBM!

Lynn hopes that
her story, and the stories of many hundreds of others who have
successfully transitioned, will help more companies understand the
importance of such protections to those involved, and the benefits
that accrue to companies that provide them.

Professor
Conway has received many major awards for her research
contributions, including the Wetherill Medal of the Franklin
Institute, the Pender Award of the Moore School at the University of
Pennsylvania, the Secretary of Defense Meritorious Achievement
Award, the Electronics Award for Achievement, Xerox Corporation's
recognition as a Xerox Research Fellow, the National Achievement
Award of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), the GLBT Engineer of
the Year Award from the National Organization of Gay and Lesbian
Scientists and Technical Professionals (NOGLSTP), an honorary
doctorate from Trinity College, election as a Fellow of the IEEE
(Lynn was the 12th woman to be so elected), election to the National
Academy of Engineering, and election to the Electronic Design Hall
of Fame.

Lynn has also served on many significant committees
and boards, including the Editorial board of IEEE Spectrum magazine,
numerous committees of the National Science Foundation and the
National Academy of Engineering, and the U.S Air Force Scientific
Advisory Board. She has served on the Board of Visitors of the U.S.
Air Force Academy (a Presidential appointment (more)), as a Member
of the Corporation of the Draper Lab, as a member of NASA's Office
of Space Science Task Force on Technology Readiness, and as a Member
of the Council of the Government-University-Industry Research
Roundtable (GUIRR) and also of the Air Force Science and Technology
Board of the National Academies.

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