Gerald Estrin

Both Gerald Estrin and Thelma Estrin, his wife of 70 years, were born in New York City, earned their doctorates in electrical engineering at the University of Wisconsin, and worked for three years with John von Neumann, the principal architect of the computer age, at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. In 1953, the Estrins accepted an offer from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel to build from scratch the first computer in the Middle East and the first outside the United States and Western Europe. By building its own computer, in the face of widespread skepticism, “Israel got into the information revolution early in the game,” he said. In 1956, both Estrins joined the UCLA faculty, Jerry to create a program in computer engineering, and Thelma as a pioneer developer of data processing in brain research. Among his many research contributions, Jerry Estrin developed the concept of “reconfigurable computing,” which led to the creation of new types of programmable computer chips that are still in use today. In addition to his wife, surviving family members include three daughters and four grandchildren