ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the functional aspects of gates and logic circuits in terms of manipulating binary signals and examines the basic circuit configurations and characteristics of various integrated circuit (IC) technologies. There are two broad categories of silicon-based IC technology, one based on bipolar transistors and the other based on unipolar metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistor. The chapter introduces the operating characteristics of a diode and demonstrates how logic gates can be built using diodes, and examines characteristics of bipolar transistors followed by an introduction to resistor-transistor logic and diode-transistor logic circuits. It describes the potential of providing ICs that are faster than the ICs in silicon technology and provides a brief introduction to optical technology, a nonelectronic technology. The chapter examines the basic circuits in N-channel MOS (NMOS) and complementary MOS (CMOS) technologies. CMOS circuits use a combination of NMOS and P-channel MOS enhancement-type transistors.
