Fred Blum became enamored with physics while attending high school in Texas and aimed for a PhD. He landed at Caltech, a pinnacle of physics education and investigation. “My graduate research taught me how to pursue knowledge in unknown territories, beginning the adventure of a lifetime,” he says.

After conducting basic research at Caltech and MIT, Blum moved into applied research at Texas Instruments and Rockwell International in the 1970s. At Rockwell, he rose quickly from research manager to vice president of the microelectronics research center. He focused his personal leadership on GaAs (gallium arsenide) and GaN (gallium nitride) semiconductor technology, which offered great promise but left much to be proven.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Blum became a pioneering entrepreneur in this field. He founded GigaBit Logic, the first GaAs digital circuit company, and cofounded Nitres, a venture company that developed world-leading GaN LEDs for lighting. He eventually sold Nitres to Cree, which became a preeminent LED lighting manufacturer.

Semiconductor GaAs and GaN devices have grown to be a $40 billion industry. Critical infrastructure enablers of much of today’s digital world, they revolutionized cell phone and fiber optic communications, enabled internet networks, and made high-efficiency LED lighting possible. They also were the basis for Nobel Prizes in physics awarded in 2000 and 2014. (Two awardees had been university consultants to Blum’s organizations at Rockwell and Nitres.)

Now retired, Blum gives back as CEO of his nonprofit, Trilience Research, which supports the integration of biology and neuroscience into the social sciences.

From the beginning, Blum’s aim has been to pursue meaningful work with curiosity and ambition. “In the 20th century, we mastered the physical sciences and brought unimaginable changes to the way we live, communicate, travel, and work,” he says. “In the 21st century, we will master the life sciences, bringing on unimaginable changes in health care, how we think, and how we relate and govern. I have spent my life in search of excellence, hoping I would make a difference to society and mankind.”