Integrated circuits(ICs)

what is Integrated circuits(ICs)
An Integrated circuit(also referred to as IC,chip,or microchip) is a miniature electronic device or component including amplifier, oscillator, timer, counter, logic gate, memory, microcontroller or microprocessor.
Adopting the exquisite craft,interconnecting together on the required transistors, resistors, capacitors and inductors in a circuit, made on a small or several small pieces of semiconductor wafer or dielectric substrate, and then encapsulated in a shell, to become a micro structure with the required circuit functions. All the components have been formed as a whole in structure, which makes the technology of making electronic components towards the micro, low power consumption, intelligence and high reliability a big step forward. It is represented in the circuit by the letter "IC".
The inventor of the integrated circuit is Jack Kilby (based on Ge) integrated circuit and Robert Noyce (based on silicon (Si) integrated circuit). The majority of today's semiconductor industry uses silicon-based integrated circuits.

Type
Integrated circuits can be broadly classified into analog, digital and mixed signal(consisting of analog and digital signaling on the same IC).
Digital integrated circuits can contain billions of logic gates, flip-flops, multiplexers, and other circuits in a few square millimeters. The small size of these circuits allows high speed, low power dissipation, and reduced manufacturing cost compared with board-level integration. These digital ICs, typically microprocessors, DSPs, and microcontrollers, use boolean algebra to process "one" and "zero" signals.
Analog integrated circuits, such as sensors, power management circuits, and operational amplifiers (op-amps), process continuous signals, and perform analog functions such as amplification, active filtering, demodulation, and mixing.
further sub-categorize
●Digital ICs are categorized as logic ICs (such as microprocessors and microcontrollers), memory chips (such as MOS memory and floating-gate memory), interface ICs (level shifters, serializer/deserializer, etc.), power management ICs, and programmable devices.
●Analog ICs are categorized as linear integrated circuits and RF circuits (radio frequency circuits).
●Mixed-signal integrated circuits are categorized as data acquisition ICs (including A/D converters, D/A converters, digital potentiometers), clock/timing ICs, switched capacitor (SC) circuits, and RF CMOS circuits.