Semicon-World

Chandrayaan 3 was a landmark moment for Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). It showcased India's space prowess and demonstrated that space missions can be economical. In 2020, the mission was estimated around 75 million USD.  For comparison, Avengers Endgame spent around 200 million USD in just marketing . A moon mission cost lesser than a big budget superhero movie. As a result of this success, the spotlight has fallen on government laboratories. Keeping in line with the theme of this blog, we shall talk about semiconductor devices used in this mission; the one that has gained the most notoriety is the VIKRAM3201 32 bit processor used in the launch vehicle. Figure 1: VIKRAM3201 processor (Reference: SCL ) Figure 2: Chandrayaan 3 Lander (Reference: Scientific American ) This processor is a triumph of India's semiconductor capabilities. Designed by Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), Thumba, and fabricated in Semiconductor Laboratory (SCL), Mohali, it is a fully indigen...

Technology has come a long way in a short time, this is the sentence we keep hearing from our elders. The transition from telephones to pagers to cell phones felt earned and hard-fought, the switch from bulky, handheld, external keyboard phones to sleek, powerful, addicting smartphones was abrupt. The rate of progress has been astounding these past few years, and at the forefront of this revolution is the technology we call semiconductor devices. You thought I was going to say VLSI? Semiconductor devices have been around for a long time, the semiconductor effect was first noted in 1874 by Karl Ferdinand Braun. Then, crystal detectors for microwave radiation emerged in 1901 when Jagadish Chandra Bose demonstrated its working. The biggest discovery came in 1947, when the first transistor was invented at Bell Labs by John Bardeen, William Shockley, and Walter Brattain, and since that event we have never looked back. The solution to the bulky vacuum tube was the small and tiny transistor. ...