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transistor

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Simple transistor circuit transistor, three-terminal, solid-state electronic device used for amplification and switching. It is the solid-state analog to the triode electron tube; the transist...

amplifier

(Encyclopedia)amplifier, device that accepts a varying input signal and produces an output signal that varies in the same way as the input but has a larger amplitude. The input signal may be a current, a voltage, a...

FET

(Encyclopedia)FET: see transistor.

Brattain, Walter Houser

(Encyclopedia)Brattain, Walter Houser, 1902–87, American physicist, b. Xiamen, China, Ph.D. Univ. of Minnesota, 1929. He was a researcher at Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, N.J. from 1929 to 1967. He then taugh...

Moore, Gordon Earle

(Encyclopedia)Moore, Gordon Earle, 1929– American engineer, inventor, and entrepreneur, b. San Francisco, Ph.D. California Institute of Technology, 1954. He joined (1956) Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory, where ...

Morita, Akio

(Encyclopedia)Morita, Akio äkˈēō môrˈētä [key], 1921–99, Japanese business executive, b. Nagoya, Japan. The eldest son of a successful sake brewer, Morita joined Masaru Ibuka to found Tokyo Telecommunicat...

thyristor

(Encyclopedia)thyristor, semiconductor switch used chiefly in power-control applications. Also called a silicon-controlled rectifier (SCR; see rectifier), it is a variation of the transistor. A thyristor is capable...

Pierce, John

(Encyclopedia)Pierce, John, 1910–2002, American electrical engineer, b. Des Moines, Iowa, grad. California Institute of Technology (Ph.D. 1936). Pierce worked at the Bell Telephone Laboratories, where he proposed...

bias, in electricity

(Encyclopedia)bias, a voltage, current, or other input applied to a device or system as a reference or to set its conditions of operation. A bias is usually steady but may vary with time, usually within a fixed and...

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