Preparing for a Career in Analog Electronics … Suat Ay Sophomore Seminar, 14 th, April 2009.

Preparing for a Career in Analog Electronics …

Suat Ay

Sophomore Seminar,14th, April 2009

Outline

ECE faculty on Analog Electronics Analog vs. Digital Electronics Courses offered Companies you can work for Types of things you can do Questions

ECE Analog Electronics Faculty

Suat Ay

Fred Barlow

K. Joe Hass

Herb Hess

Ken Noren Rick Wells

What is this?

VoutVinVoutVin

What is this?

VoutVinVoutVin

Compact, High gain, High Speed, Single-stage amplifier for an ANALOG Engineer

Analog vs. Digital Signals

Analog Signal : A signal defined over a continuous range of time and amplitude.

Digital Signal: A signal defined only at discrete values of time and amplitude.

Analog = Digital + Every point in between!

Analog vs. Digital Electronics

Physical signals are continuous in time and amplitude. (Life is Analog)• Audio, Video, Biological, Seismic,

Energy, etc. However, digital signals are

• Easy to process• Highly immune to noise• Robust

Do processing as much as possible in digital domain

Analog vs. Digital Electronics

> Sensors> Analog Filters > Amplifiers> A/D Converters> Analog Processing> ...

> Bias & Reference> Regulators> Watch-dog Functions> Protection Circuits> ...

> D/A Converters> Analog Filters > Amplifiers> Power Drivers> RF / Comm.> ...

Digital Electronics

World

Analog Electronics World

Power Management

Front-EndInterface

Back-EndInterface

Physical World

Physical World

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ASIC (Trend)80% Digital20% Analog

Design Time20% Digital80% Analog

What courses do I need to take?

Required courses ECE 210 - Electric Circuits I ECE 211 - Electric Circuits Lab I ECE 212 - Electric Circuits II ECE 213 - Electric Circuits Lab II ECE 310 - Fundamentals of

Electronics ECE 311 - Fundamentals of

Electronics Lab

Technical Electives (Strongly Recommended)

Electives emphasize: IC And Discrete Design

ECE 410 - Advanced Electronics• Multistage amplifiers• Feedback circuits• Frequency response of electronic

circuits• The “fundamentals” of designing an

op-amp ECE 411 - Advanced Electronics Lab

• Integrated Circuit (IC) Design and Layout

Technical Electives

ECE 412 – Analog Filter Design The design of filters circuits

containing passive (R’s, L’s, and C’s) active elements (transistors, op-amps, etc.)• Lowpass, highpass, bandpass, and

notch filters.• Examples: audio filters, bass, treble,

crossover.• IC and discrete circuit design

Technical Electives

ECE 413 - Communication Circuits• The study of the building blocks which

compose communication systems and the circuits.

• AM and FM radio, Television, Cell phones

• Microelectronic circuit design– Design of RF integrated circuits (IC)

Technical Electives

ECE 415 - Analog Integrated Circuit Design• Basic IC building blocks for CMOS

technology.• Design of CMOS op-amps, references,

and comparators.• Microelectronic circuit design

– Design of integrated circuits (IC)

Technical Electives

ECE 416 - Applications of Linear Integrated Circuits• Practical circuits using operational

amplifiers, voltage regulators, video amplifiers, etc.

• “Discrete” Circuit design– Circuit design with “Off the shelf

components”

Technical Electives

ECE 417 - Pulse and Digital Circuits• How are NAND gates, inverters, logic

functions implemented? What are their limitations? (Speed and noise considerations, etc.)

• How to make a better logic gate• Phase-locked loops, delay locked

loops, multivibrators, charge pumps, oscillators, etc.

• Microelectronic circuit design– Design of mixed-signal integrated circuits

(IC)

Technical Electives

ECE 466 - Solid State Electronics • Physical principles behind the

operation of semiconductors such as diodes, BJT's, capacitors, MOSFETs, and FETs. modeling of semiconductor devices.

– How these devices work• Strongly recommended for anyone

interested in either microelectronic circuits - analog OR digital

Before Graduation

Try to do a Co-Op or an Internship

After Graduation...

Where are our analog alumni?

Micron (Boise) AMIS (Pocatello) Cypress Tektronics (Portland, Oregon)

• Maxtek Triquent Semiconductor (Portland) Hewlett Packard (Boise and all

over) Agilent (Liberty Lake)

Where are our analog alumni?

Maxim (Portland, Oregon) Intel National Semiconductor Telcom Keytronics Texas Instruments Numerous small companies

What are our analog alumni doing?

Mixed signal circuit design.• Analog to digital converters and

conversions circuits RF and communication circuit

design Audio/Stereo/Amplifier design Testing Product development

Questions?