How do they manufacture microchips?

Initially mined as silica sand or quartz, silicon dioxide is an essential element of many products, not just computer components. It's also used for ferroconcrete, glass, solar panels, water production and, interestingly, as a proppant for oil and gas fracking.

How are microchips made?

The sand is melted and cast in the form of a large cylinder called an ‘ingot’. This ingot is then sliced into thin wafers. A microchip the size of your fingernail contains billions of transistors, so it’s easy to understand just how small the features on a chip need to be. Chip features are measured in nanometers.

What are microchips used for?

They are, for example, in computers or smartphones and thus form the basis of our modern digitalization. Whether as control and computing units or complex memory elements, microchips are used extensively in a wide range of applications, e.g. in process control and measurement technology or medical technology.

What are the two types of microchips?

There are two major types of microchips: Logic chips and Memory chips. Logic chips are the ‘brains’ of electronic devices – they process information to complete a task. Among Logic chips, CPUs (central processing units) are the ‘original’ chips, first designed in the 1960s. But there are also processors with specific functionality in mind, ...