Integrated circuit

Integrated circuit (IC), also known as a microchip, is a set of electronic circuits on a small flat piece (or "chip") of semiconductor material, normally silicon. The integration of large numbers of tiny transistors into a small chip was a huge advancement over the manual assembly of circuits using discrete electronic components.

History

The idea of integrating electronic circuits into a single device was born when the German physicist and engineer Werner Jacobi developed and patented the first known integrated transistor amplifier in 1949 and the British radio engineer Geoffrey Dummer proposed to integrate a variety of standard electronic components in a monolithic semiconductor crystal in 1952. A year later, Harwick Johnson filed a patent for a prototype IC.

Design

The design process for ICs, using various Electronic design automation (EDA) tools, is called IC design. ICs can be designed by hand, but practical ICs are designed with EDA tools because they are too complex to design by hand.

Fabrication

ICs are made of silicon, which is abundant in the Earth's crust. The process of IC fabrication is a multiple-step sequence of photolithographic and chemical processing steps during which electronic circuits are gradually created on a wafer made of pure semiconducting material.

Types of ICs

There are several types of integrated circuits; the most common types are digital, analog and mixed signal (both analog and digital on the same chip). Digital integrated circuits can contain anywhere from one million to 1 billion logic gates, amplifiers, oscillators, counters, computer memory, or complete microprocessors.

Applications

Integrated circuits have many applications, including in digital watches, mobile phones, computers, calculators, automotives, and televisions. They are also used in military and industrial technology.

See also

• Semiconductor device fabrication
• Microprocessor
• Transistor
• Computer memory

References

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