One article teaches you everything you need to know about the semiconductor industry!

Semiconductor components are vital to the function of many modern advancements, such as high-tech AI, anti vibration table Internet development, mobile phones, 3C products, and household appliances. Taiwan's involvement in the global economic and technological supply chain is largely due to its role in the production of semiconductors. It could be said that the semiconductor industry is the backbone of Taiwan's economy. To gain a better understanding of this industry, it is important to analyze its principles and characteristics.

How does the semiconductor industry work?

In the semiconductor industry, raw materials like silicon are converted into chips that are used to power electronic devices of everyday use. semiconductor test Without these chips, we wouldn't be able to withdraw cash from our credit cards, our phones wouldn't be able to store our address books, our cars wouldn't be able to turn on their directional lights, or even open the trunk of our cars. In today's world, chips have become as important as air as an indispensable presence.

Wafers: what are they?

A wafer is a round sheet of a semiconductor crystal, usually a cut fragment of a cylindrical semiconductor crystal. It is used as a substrate in the manufacturing process of integrated circuits and solar cells. Since it is round, voltage probe it is called a wafer. Among wafer materials, silicon is the most common. Other wafers include gallium nitride wafers and silicon carbide wafers. Monocrystalline silicon wafers account for the majority of wafer production.

Application of semiconductors in the domestic market

Artificial intelligence (AI), fifth-generation mobile communications (5G), cloud computing, industrial automation, smart cars, and data analytics are all driving semiconductor demand as IoT applications expand.

Semiconductors: what are they?

Semiconductors: an introduction

From mobile phones to household appliances, Internet and other cloud services rely on semiconductor components.

A semiconductor is a material with special physical properties that normally do not conduct electricity without an external current, but applying a voltage to a material that doesn't conduct electricity will create a semiconductor material that allows a current to pass through.

Since semiconductors were developed based on the concept of "whether a material can freely switch its conductivity", most electronic products contain core units that process information based on the rate of change of semiconductor conductivity.

By applying or blocking currents to semiconductor integrated circuits (ICs), logical operations can also be performed in a computer!

Semiconductors: an introduction

Principles of semiconductors

A silicon semiconductor is doped with pentavalent elements (phosphorus, arsenic, antimony, etc.). N-type silicon is formed, while trivalent elements (aluminum, boron, indium, gallium, etc.) are doped, resulting in P-type silicon. Clever placement can lead us to the circuit we want. Today's electronics contain millions of basic circuits, all derived from the transistor.

Element of a semiconductor

A semiconductor is a material from which diodes and transistors are made.

Semiconductors can be seen as opening and closing doors, the difference between a transistor and a diode is the switch!

The diode

A diode connected to a unidirectional switch can only pass current in one direction, even if the switch is on.

An electronic device

When a transistor is on, current can flow in both directions!

The engineer who designed this complex circuit IC needs us to use technology to cleverly arrange and combine the diode and transistor in the circuit to accomplish the function he wants!

Materials used in semiconductors

The silicon molecule (Si)

A lot of materials have been used to develop semiconductors, but silicon is the most widely used and most popular, because silicon is a ubiquitous element, is easy to obtain and inexpensive. Silicon became a mainstream semiconductor material as a result of this, and it is still an influential semiconductor material.

Semiconductor compound

Composed of more than two elements in the compound, this semiconductor material has different properties depending on the composition of the elements in the compound.

GaAs (gallium arsenide)

Due to electrons' speed, they have high frequency characteristics, high temperature resistance, and high voltage, making them ideal for applications in the 5G era that require extreme switching speed components.

Silicon carbide (SiC) and gallium nitride (GaN)

It is a wide band gap compound semiconductor, which has a better operating frequency than silicon, and because the band gap is more spacious, it can withstand a greater degree of voltage, which means it has great development potential for high-power transmission and other applications, such as cash electric cars.

Semiconductors: what are they?

How does the semiconductor industry work?

There are hundreds of processing steps involved in manufacturing integrated circuits as part of the semiconductor process, which is the lifeblood of the semiconductor industry. In semiconductor manufacturing, shadowing, etching, deposition, doping, and flattening are the steps involved. The main purpose of these steps is to produce circuits on wafers, but they also need to go through cutting, testing, packaging, and more to turn into the chip we see today!

What is the difference between a semiconductor and a chip?