Basic course in electronics. The student knows the basic principles of electricity and has a notion of the passive components used in electronics (resistor, capacitor, inductor). The student understands the laws of Kirchoff, the concepts of a Norton and Thevenin equivalent and can solve a 1st and 2nd order network.

Make sure to bring your own laptop.

Not open for KU Leuven students.

The course aims at giving an introduction on chip design. The course will give a broad view on the topic starting from the materials and processes that are used over circuits made of the famous ‘transistor’ towards chips that create artificial intelligence (AI). After the course, the student should have insight in:

-       - The materials used for chips

-       - The processes for chip fabrication

-       - Transistors, what they are and how they operate

-       - Basic analog circuits

-       - Basic mixed-mode circuits

-       - Digital circuits composed of gates, bits and bytes

-       - The beginning principles of architectures for AI

-       - Basic RF circuits

Hands-on sessions will allow the student to practice the learned principles and see the building blocks of a chip working in real life.

Monday:

From sand to wafer, from wafer to chips

Chip housing, chip ecosystem

Tuesday:

The keystone of a chip

Transistor models for analog, digital and RF

Analog chip design

Wednesday:

Mixed-signal chip design

Hands-on analog circuits

Thursday:

Digital IC design

Hands-on digital circuit design

Friday:

RF IC design basics

RF circuits

Evaluation + Lab visit

Multiple-choice exam with questions from the different topics

Welcome session on Saturday 14/11 at 5 pm

City trip on Sunday 15/11, whole day

Evening activities TBD

Farewell reception on Friday 20/11 at 4 pm