| Most silicon chips are smaller than the nail on your little | | | | impurities into different sections of a pure silicon crystal. |
| finger, yet they are the hidden 'brains' discovered inside | | | | The new transistors carried out the same function as |
| almost every electronic device. These tiny slithers of | | | | old-fashioned thermionic valves - they amplified or |
| material are proving to be a bigger influence on | | | | strengthened electric signals fed into them - but they |
| modern life than the steam engine during the industrial | | | | took up far less space and used much less energy. |
| revolution. | | | | Semiconductor transistors soon started to replace |
| Silicon chips are utilized for a wide range of | | | | thermionic valves in all sorts of electronic equipment, |
| applications. They guide satellites into orbit close to the | | | | from radio sets to computers. At first, transistors had |
| Earth. They control signals and monitor train | | | | been used as individual elements on printed circuit |
| movements around railway networks. They record | | | | boards (PCBs). Nevertheless, in 1958, Texas |
| and control the flow of cash between banks, shops | | | | Instruments developed a technique of making separate |
| and building societies. They can even wake us up in | | | | elements on a single crystal of silicon. Transistors, |
| the morning with a fresh pot of coffee. This revolution | | | | resistors and many other elements were made by |
| in electronic wizardry began in 1948 in the Bell | | | | adding impurities into various sections of the crystal. |
| Telephone Laboratories, USA. Here research scientists | | | | These new electrical circuits were called integrated |
| produced the first semiconductor transistor - a | | | | circuits (ICs), and also the wafer of silicon on which |
| pea-sized component created by adding (implanting) | | | | they were formed became known as a silicon chip. |