Heike Riel

Biography

Successfully bridging the gap between basic science and practical applications, Heike Riel’s innovations in developing semiconductor nanoscale materials and organic light-emitting devices (OLEDs) have profoundly impacted the proliferation of more powerful and efficient electronics and displays. She led the development of template-assisted selective epitaxy (TASE), a unique technique to integrate high-quality, arbitrarily shaped nanostructures on silicon, and developed gate-all-around field-effect transistors, tunnel devices, and photodiodes, providing a versatile platform for integrated electronics, optoelectronics, and quantum computing. Her work on OLED technologies resulted in the successful 20-inch, full-color, active-matrix OLED display in 2003. She has demonstrated highly efficient, long-term stable OLEDs with excellent red, green, and blue color coordinates, providing lightweight and more efficient displays for applications including high-end televisions, smartphones, and light panels.

An IEEE Senior Member, Riel is IBM Fellow; head of science and technology at IBM Research, Zurich, Switzerland; and leads IBM Research Quantum Europe and Africa.