Integrated Circuit: A Nanoscale Device with a Non-Negotiable Impact in Our Daily Lives

Integrated Circuit:

A Nanoscale Device with a Non-Negotiable Impact in Our Daily Lives

Engr. Darwin M. Tacubanza, ECE, ECT, CLSSYB

Master of Science in Computer Engineering major in Data Science and Engineering (ongoing)

Note on the Research Paper

A partial fulfilment for the subject, Analysis and Design of Integrated Circuits (CPE 633)
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Abstract

Electronic devices are not a new concept in the modern-day society. There are a wide range of

variety of devices available for personal, educational, and business purposes. To mention a few

of them: from the most common such as computers, laptops, tablet, phones, to emerging

technologies such as wearables, smart appliances, medical devices, and reaches to specific fields

of expertise such as weather forecasting, financial, government services, entertainment, etc.

From the first and simple electronic devices, to sophisticated gadgets, they have integrated

circuits at its core, through its efficiency, and continuously being upgraded to be more concise

while enhancing its computing power. This study will explain the key advancements of

integrated circuits and their contributions. The capacity of integrated circuits grows

incrementally following the law observed by Moore helps its users to conquer impossible

challenges. The connections in IC are increasingly becoming more complex and unlocks

additional capabilities to the next generation of devices for its users. There is an intense upgrade

in computing power for integrated circuits which benefits the user to approach more complicated

problems. The compiled findings concluded that integrated circuits pushed to a nanoscale level

has created a non-negotiable impact in our daily lives.

Keywords: integrated circuits, technology, electronic devices, digital, microelectronic

industry, nanoscale
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Introduction

An IC is the fundamental building block of all modern electronic devices. As the name

suggests, it's an integrated system of multiple miniaturized and interconnected components

embedded into a thin substrate of semiconductor material (usually silicon crystal).1 The advent of

the integrated circuit revolutionized the electronics industry and paved the way for devices such

as mobile phones, computers, CD players, televisions, and many appliances found around the

home. In addition, the spread of the chips helped to bring advanced electronic devices to all parts

of the world.2 The enormous leap that the IC chip gave to electronic circuit design is based on a

limitation that electronics manufacturers were facing during the late 1950s.3 In 1958, working

alone in the laboratory at Texas Instruments, a physicist named Jack St. Clair Kilby (1923- )

wrote in his notebook that he thought resistors, capacitors, transistors, and diodes could all be

assembled into a circuit on a single silicon wafer.4 Today, the IC is still a vital part of many

different types of electronic devices. It is recognized as one of the most important inventions of

the 20th century and has led to the elevation of Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce to be considered

the inventors of the integrated chip.2

Gordon Moore (1929- ) is one of the founders of Intel. After graduating from high

school, he attended the University of California at Berkeley (UCB) and studied chemistry. After

receiving his bachelor’s degree in 1950, he pursued a higher educational degree and received his

doctoral degree in physical chemistry in 1954. In 1965, he served as the director of the Fairchild

Semiconductor Research and Development Laboratory. Moore was invited to write a review for

Electronics magazine’s 35th anniversary entitled “Cramming more components onto integrated

circuits”. Moore found that a new chip has approximately two times the capacity of the previous

generation’s chip. Furthermore, each new chip is produced 18 - 24 months after the previous
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generation. This discovery is called Moore’s law, which not only applies to the development of

memory chips but also illustrates the development of processor competence and disk drive

storage capacity. Moore’s law has become the industrial foundation of performance prediction in

several fields.6

While the very first integrated circuits were referred to as small-scale integration (SSI)

circuits and contained only a few dozen components. As the number of components that could be

placed on a chip was scaled up, the uses of integrated circuits became much more widespread.

Medium-scale integration (MSI) chip models contained hundreds of components by the end of

the 1960s, and large-scale integration (LSI) could put multiple thousands of components on one

chip five years later. From there, the growth of how many components could be packed into an

area of a few square centimeters increased exponentially. Very-large-scale integration (VLSI)

allowing for hundreds of thousands of connected components.3

Due to the improvement of the technology in building integrated circuits, primarily due to

the decrease in the individual devices as well as in the increase in the area of the circuit, there has

been a rapid growth in the number of transistors on an integrated circuit since the first such

circuit was fabricated in 1961 with only four transistors. At present, a typical integrated circuit

has about 80 million transistors. The single most important criterion is to keep in check the

enormous heat produced by such circuits.7

We observed the technological advances of integrated circuits since its conceptual

ideation until its current architecture and design. These events created significant impact to

different industries, and we will focus on its effect in our day – to – day set – up.
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Contribution of Integrated Circuits in Our Daily Lives

Various research documents were read, compiled, citated, and analyzed to summarize

how the advances in integrated circuits introduced significant effects in our daily lives. These are

categorized by the following ideas below:

The incrementing capacity of integrated circuits over time resulted to conquering

impossible challenges for humans:

At the time, the recently invented transistor was inspiring engineers to design evermore

complex electronic circuits and equipment containing hundreds or thousands of discrete

components such as transistors, diodes, rectifiers, and capacitors. But the problem was that these

components still had to be interconnected to form electronic circuits, and hand-soldering

thousands of components to thousands of bits of wire was expensive and time-consuming. It was

also unreliable; every soldered joint was a potential source of trouble. The challenge was to find

cost-effective, reliable ways of interconnecting these components and producing them.8

The first integrated circuits were relatively slow, replaced only a handful of components,

and sold for many times the price of their discrete transistor counterparts. Aerospace and military

systems were among the few applications where the low power consumption and small size

outweighed these drawbacks.9

President John F. Kennedy's (1917-1963) call to put a man on the Moon by the end of the

decade created a market for the integrated circuit overnight—nowhere would the advantages of

miniaturization be more welcome than aboard spacecraft.4

These uses, as well as needs by the US Navy, accounted for the bulk of early demand for

integrated circuits as of 1962. By 1968, uses of integrated circuits had begun to spread to
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consumer electronics, with their ability to process frequency modulated (FM) sound in

televisions.3

Large electronic data processing systems for business and scientific applications are

called "mainframe" computers. In the 1960s mainframe vendors distinguished their systems in

the marketplace through proprietary hardware, operating systems, and applications software.

They demanded components offering unique features and significantly faster speed.9

In 1978, computers executed 1,400 instructions per second/watt. That number has

increased to 40 million instructions per second/watt this year – an improvement of nearly 3

million percent!10 For the past half-century, ICs have progressed enormously with faster speeds,

greater capacity, and smaller sizes.1

The worldwide development of integrated circuits has become more rapid, and a new

generation seems to emerge almost every 3 years. Science and technology have achieved

astonishing progress over the 20th century, and the next century will bring even greater

breakthroughs in the areas of physical science, information science, bioengineering, materials

science, cosmology, and environmental science.7

The integrated circuit was the answer to a difficult technological problem known as the

“tyranny of numbers.”8 As ICs began to incorporate hundreds of gates and thousands of

transistors, the computers they enabled were harnessed to speed the design task and eliminate

errors. This process is called CAD (Computer Aided Design) or EDA (Electronic Design

Automation). Digital is the most efficient form for manipulating many kinds of information.

However, real world data is analog in nature and must be converted to digital form for

processing.9 One common example of a modern-day IC is the computer processor, which

typically contains millions or billions of transistors, capacitors, logic gates, etc., connected
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together to form a complex digital circuit.1 Some of these chips (for example, an encryption or

image compression chip) work on digital signals and are called digital ICs, whereas others work

on analog or both types of signals, and called analog/mixed-signal (AMS) chips.7

The challenges are not inconsequential. Creating new devices with features smaller than

one nanometer – one one-billionth of a meter – will require the invention of a new switch, use of

new materials, and implementation of new assembly methods.10

Scientists and engineers around the world are engaged in basic research to develop new

technologies for nano-scale devices that will enable continued progress well into the 21st

century.10

The increasing complexity of integrated circuit designs and architecture created more

intensive capabilities and opportunities for its users

In the nearly half century since the first working silicon integrated circuit was unveiled,

“smaller, faster, cheaper” has become the mantra of the microelectronics industry.10

Breakthroughs in integrated circuit materials can lead to drastic changes in the microelectronics

industry.7

Compared to the early days, today's ICs are unbelievably complex, capable of holding

billions of transistors and other components on a single small piece of material. The modern IC

is all one piece, with individual components embedded directly into the silicon crystal, rather

than simply mounted on it.1

This invention set in motion the technology that would enable the second industrial

revolution, and its in-situ form made it possible for future generations of integrated circuits to
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become orders of magnitude smaller and more powerful. Today, the integrated circuit is the

fundamental building block of all electronic equipment.8

That revolution has indeed occurred. Integrated circuits have enhanced our lives in

countless ways. The microelectronics industry, to which integrated circuits gave birth, has

created millions of jobs.4 The microelectronics industry will play a major role in meeting this

challenge by enabling people everywhere to do more with less energy. Semiconductor

technology is also playing a huge role in the creation of more efficient and more effective solar

panels, which hold the promise of providing a new and sustainable source of energy.10

The uses of integrated circuits are widespread throughout industrial plants and in

robotics, as well as for controls in automobile and aircraft systems. As they become more

sophisticated and inexpensive to manufacture, they are also found in disposable items such as

greeting cards that play music. Radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags on disposable

consumer product packaging that retail stores use to track inventory are also a common location

for IC chips, with RFID tags being added to other products like passports and credit cards as

well.3

The pioneers of the microelectronics industry and the engineers and scientists who are at

work around the world today to enable the next wave of creative destruction share one common

quality: they are incurable optimists who believe that every challenge and every obstacle to

continued progress also brings new opportunities.10

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The intense computing power offered by integrated circuits will offer the incredible

convenience for its users:

Today it is hard to imagine a world without personal computers, cell phones, the Internet,

email, ecommerce, digital cameras, and a host of other products made possible by advances in

microchip technology.10

The IC made our lives infinitely better. A modern laptop computer is thousands of times

more powerful and about 100 times smaller than the first computer developed in the 1940s. The

ENIAC was about as large as three to four double-decker buses and ran on 18,000 vacuum

tubes.1

Noyce’s invention provided the breakthrough enabling seemingly unlimited scalability.

Today, the most advanced chips contain two billion transistors on a sliver of silicon about the

size of a dime. The pervasiveness of integrated circuits has grown exponentially as microchips

have enabled an incredible variety of electronic devices that existed only in science fiction half a

century ago. 10

The multiple control and mathematical processing functions that an integrated circuit can

perform has made them ubiquitous devices in most consumer electronics from radios and

televisions to calculators and digital watches.3 The first cell phones were large by today’s

standards. The early units had limited functionality, relatively short battery life, and not much

storage capacity – and they were more expensive than the typical smart phone of today.10

Machines run more cleanly and efficiently, medical technology saves lives, and banks the

world over exchange money through electronic networks, all thanks to integrated circuits. In

poorer countries, technologies built on integrated circuits have decreased the cost of capital
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A Nanoscale Device with a Non-Negotiable Impact in Our Daily Lives

investment required for industrialization and development, allowing those countries to compete

in the global marketplace.4

We have adjusted very quickly to the microelectronics revolution. Washing machines,

digital clocks and watches, the scoreboard in a ballpark, the bar code on your groceries, and the

collar that lets only your cat to go in and out of its cat flap are just a few of the mundane

applications of integrated circuits that we take for granted every day.4

For more than 60 years, progress in microelectronics has enabled people everywhere to

become more productive, to enjoy a higher standard of living, and to believe that their children

can expect an even brighter future. There is little doubt that our best days are yet to come!10
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A Nanoscale Device with a Non-Negotiable Impact in Our Daily Lives

Conclusion

Integrated circuit is a device that created a huge impact in the history. A need for such

devices came from the demand to solve man’s challenges and the roadblocks offered by

traditional active and passive electronic devices. Notable inventors were mentioned responsible

for the conceptual framework of a device that will be composed of electronic components

arranged and connected in a systematic way to miniaturize the size of existing electronic circuits.

The first set of integrated circuits were not the same as envisioned, but it took a great leap

over the years of its progress. Integrated circuits become more capable to help human’s solving

impossible challenges. The first set of humans took a great leap and stepped in the moon. The

challenge of analyzing analog signals became possible with the introduction of digital signals.

The problem about impossible large calculations was solved by integrated circuits.

A pattern was observed with the progress of these devices where it shrinks in size while it

doubles its capacity every 2 years, as proposed by Moore. To push its progress, connections

within the device became more complex, thus unlocking an increased number of opportunities

such as jobs, further studies, applications and alike. This positive event also extends with the

application of integrated circuits in industrial setting such as robotics, logistics, science and

technology and we expect more opportunities to come by as we progress in developing more

capable and complex devices.

We cannot deny that integrated circuits are part of our daily lives. Computer enhances

our capabilities and offers convenience with its fast processing. Surrounded by integrated

circuits, our lives became better and efficient.

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References
1
https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/integrated-circuit-IC
2
https://anysilicon.com/history-integrated-circuit/
3
https://www.easytechjunkie.com/what-are-the-uses-of-integrated-circuits.htm
4
"The Development of Integrated Circuits Makes Possible the Microelectronics

Revolution ." Science and Its Times: Understanding the Social Significance of Scientific

Discovery. . Retrieved October 25, 2021 from Encyclopedia.com:

https://www.encyclopedia.com/science/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-

maps/development-integrated-circuits-makes-possible-microelectronics-revolution
6
https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=81155
7
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/physics-and-astronomy/integrated-circuits
8
https://ethw.org/Milestones:First_Semiconductor_Integrated_Circuit_(IC),_1958
9
https://www.computerhistory.org/siliconengine/aerospace-systems-are-first-the-

applications-for-ics-in-computers/
10
https://www.jef.or.jp/journal/pdf/161th_cover07.pdf