I just saw this on Engadget, the man who revolutionized digital imaging has passed on.
We have some sad news to share with you today: Willard Boyle, the man who created the imaging technology behind everything from digital cameras to barcode scanners, has died at the age of 86. In 2009, Boyle shared a Nobel Prize in physics for inventing the CCD, which allowed people to capture images in digital format for the first time.
The article goes on to say that the groundwork started in 1969. I guess formal recognition took its time.