Valerie L. Thomas
NASA scientist who patented the illusion transmitter
At a glance
- Inventor
- Valerie L. Thomas
- Life
- b. 1943
- Birthplace
- Baltimore, Maryland
- Country
- United States
- Region
- United States
- Era
- 1950–2000
- Fields
- Science & Engineering, Space & Aerospace
- Evidence
- Verified
- Records
- 1 in this archive
What they did
Thomas managed NASA's Landsat image-processing systems and patented an optical device using concave mirrors to transmit an image that appears as a real three-dimensional object in space.
Historical context
Flat screens cannot show depth. Thomas began from a 1970s exhibition demonstration of concave-mirror illusions and asked whether the effect could be transmitted.
The legacy
Cited in later work on 3-D display and imaging; her Landsat work underpins decades of Earth-observation data.
The evidence
US Patent 4,229,761 — Illusion transmitter
Primary recordValerie Thomas NASA personnel and project records
Primary record
Documentation strength
- 2
- Sources
- 2
- Primary
- 2
- Publishers
Calculated from the sources actually attached to this record — the closer a source sits to the original document, the more it counts. It is never asserted by hand.