Norman Abramson, one of the pioneers behind wireless networks, has died at 88, The New York Times reports. Abramson and the team of graduate students and faculty he led were responsible for creating ALOHAnet, an early wireless network whose innovative techniques are still being used today in modern satellite, phone, and computer networks.
Abramson died of skin cancer that had metastasized in his lungs, according to The New York Times.
An engineer and student of communications theory — a discipline at the intersection of mathematics, information theory, and semiotics — Abramson studied at Harvard, and he received a master’s at UCLA and a PhD from Stanford. He was drawn to Hawaii partly because of his love of surfing, and in 1966, took a...