Preparing for a Career in
Analog Electronics …
Suat Ay
Sophomore Seminar,
14th, April 2009
Outline
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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?
Vin
Vout
Vin
Vout
What is this?
Vin
Vout
Vin
Vout
Compact, High gain, High Speed, Singlestage amplifier for an ANALOG Engineer
Analog vs. Digital Signals
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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
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Physical signals are continuous in time
and amplitude. (Life is Analog)
• Audio, Video, Biological, Seismic, Energy, etc.
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However, digital signals are
• Easy to process
• Highly immune to noise
• Robust
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Do processing as much as possible in
digital domain
Analog vs. Digital Electronics
Physical World
> Sensors
> Analog Filters
> Amplifiers
> A/D Converters
> Analog Processing
> ...
Digital
Electronics
World
> D/A Converters
> Analog Filters
> Amplifiers
> Power Drivers
> RF / Comm.
> ...
Back-End
Interface
Front-End
Interface
> Bias & Reference
> Regulators
> Watch-dog Functions
> Protection Circuits
> ...
Power Management
Physical World
Physical World
Physical World
Analog Electronics World
ASIC (Trend)
80% Digital
20% Analog
Design Time
20% Digital
80% Analog
What courses do I need to take?
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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)
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Electives emphasize: IC And Discrete Design
ECE 410 - Advanced Electronics
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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Try to do a Co-Op or an Internship
After Graduation...
Where are our analog alumni?
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Micron (Boise)
AMIS (Pocatello)
Cypress
Tektronics (Portland, Oregon)
• Maxtek
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Triquent Semiconductor (Portland)
Hewlett Packard (Boise and all over)
Agilent (Liberty Lake)
Where are our analog alumni?
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Maxim (Portland, Oregon)
Intel
National Semiconductor
Telcom
Keytronics
Texas Instruments
Numerous small companies
What are our analog alumni
doing?
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Mixed signal circuit design.
• Analog to digital converters and conversions
circuits
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RF and communication circuit design
Audio/Stereo/Amplifier design
Testing
Product development
Questions?