Gabor was born as
Günszberg Dénes, into a
Jewish family in
Budapest, Austria-Hungary. In 1900, his family converted to
Lutheranism. Dennis was the first-born son of Günszberg Bernát and Jakobovits Adél. Despite having a religious background, religion played a minor role in his later life and he considered himself agnostic. In 1902, the family received permission to change their surname from Günszberg to Gábor. He served with the Hungarian artillery in northern Italy during
World War I. He began his studies in engineering at the
Budapest University of Technology and Economics in 1918, later in Germany, at the
Technische Hochschule Charlottenburg in
Berlin, now known as
Technische Universität Berlin. At the start of his career, he analysed the properties of high voltage electric transmission lines by using cathode-beam oscillographs, which led to his interest in electron optics. He experimented with a heavily filtered
mercury arc light source. Gabor's work in this and related areas was foundational in the development of
time–frequency analysis. In 1948 Gabor moved from Rugby to
Imperial College London, and in 1958 became professor of
Applied Physics until his retirement in 1967. His inaugural lecture on 3 March 1959, 'Electronic Inventions and their Impact on Civilisation' provided inspiration for
Norbert Wiener's treatment of self-reproducing machines in the penultimate chapter in the 1961 edition of his book
Cybernetics. As part of his many developments related to CRTs, in 1958 Gabor patented a new
flat screen television concept. This used an
electron gun aimed perpendicular to the screen, rather than straight at it. The beam was then directed forward to the screen using a series of fine metal wires on either side of the beam path. The concept was significantly similar to the
Aiken tube, introduced in the US the same year. This led to a many-years
patent battle which resulted in Aiken keeping the US rights and Gabor the UK. Gabor's version was later picked up by
Clive Sinclair in the 1970s, and became a decades-long quest to introduce the concept commercially. Its difficult manufacturing, due to the many wires within the vacuum tube, meant this was never successful. While looking for a company willing to try to manufacture it, Sinclair began negotiations with
Timex, who instead took over production of the
ZX81. In 1963 Gabor published
Inventing the Future which discussed the three major threats Gabor saw to modern society: war, overpopulation and the Age of Leisure. The book contained the now well-known expression that "the future cannot be predicted, but futures can be invented." Reviewer
Nigel Calder described his concept as, "His basic approach is that we cannot predict the future, but we can invent it..." Others such as
Alan Kay,
Peter Drucker, and
Forrest Shaklee have used various forms of similar quotes. His next book,
Innovations: scientific, technological, and social which was published in 1970, expanded on some of the topics he had already earlier touched upon, and also pointed to his interest in technological innovation as mechanism of both liberation and destruction. In 1971 he was the single recipient of the
Nobel Prize in Physics with the motivation "for his invention and development of the holographic method" and presented the history of the development of holography from 1948 in his Nobel lecture. While spending much of his retirement in Italy at
Lavinio Rome, he remained connected with Imperial College as a senior research fellow and also became staff scientist of
CBS Laboratories, in
Stamford, Connecticut; there, he collaborated with his lifelong friend, CBS Labs' president
Dr. Peter C. Goldmark in many new schemes of communication and display. One of Imperial College's new halls of residence in Prince's Gardens,
Knightsbridge is named Gabor Hall in honour of Gabor's contribution to Imperial College. He developed an interest in social analysis and published
The Mature Society: a view of the future in 1972. He also joined the
Club of Rome and supervised a working group studying energy sources and technical change. The findings of this group were published in the report
Beyond the Age of Waste in 1978, a report which was an early warning of several issues that only later received widespread attention. Following the rapid development of lasers and a wide variety of holographic applications (e.g., art, information storage, and the recognition of patterns), Gabor achieved acknowledged success and worldwide attention during his lifetime. ==Personal life==