Engineer’s work led to integrated circuit

Kurt Lehovec, 93, an electrical engineer whose pioneering research led to the development of the integrated circuit and the advancement of semiconductor technology in the late 1950s, died Feb. 17 at his home in Los Angeles, his family said. The cause was not specified.

In his work on light-emitting diodes, or LEDS, Lehovec is known for inventing the process of junction isolation for integrated circuits while he was working for Sprague Electric Co.

He received a patent for the innovation in 1959 but otherwise did not profit from the groundbreaking work. That same year, while working for Fairchild Semiconductor Corp., Robert Noyce built on Lehovec’s idea in developing the completely integrated electronic circuit on a small silicon chip that could then be commercially produced.

Lehovec was born June 12, 1918, in what is now the Czech Republic and earned a doctorate in physics at Charles University in Prague. He was drafted into the German army during World War II but then released so he could to return to his research at the university.

After the war, he was recruited to work for the U.S. Signal Corps in Monmouth, N.J., arriving in 1947.

Lehovec became a naturalized citizen in 1952, the same year he went to work for Sprague in Massachusetts.

He left Sprague in 1966 and became a consultant for aerospace companies in Southern California. He taught engineering at USC from the early 1970s to the late ’80s.

Late in life, Lehovec began writing poetry and became part of the local poetry scene at coffeehouses and readings.