Overview

The Professional Certificate Program covers the operating principles of semiconductor devices for integrated circuits including semiconductor materials, solid-state physics, PN junction, photodiodes, solar cells, Bipolar Junction Transistors, MOS Capacitor, Charge Coupled Devices, CMOS image sensors, MOSFETs, and Advanced Field Effect Transistors such as FinFET, Gate-All-Around FET, and 2D MOSFETs.

The program starts with the basic energy band diagrams and explains the operating principle of each device in detail. It also explains the approaches to adjust the devices’ performance and design a device with desirable specifications. Finally, the device equivalent circuit model will be introduced to connect the devices from applications.

In this program, we take a more intuitive approach to exploring the underlying concepts. Eschewing mathematics, we use engaging animations to help you visualize the working principles of many common semiconductor devices.

Whether you are completely new to the subject or an experienced engineer, this program will give you a different perspective and a new way to look at the behaviors of semiconductor devices.

Reducing the reliance on equations does not mean the depth of the material is sacrificed. In fact, the program provides even more in-depth explanations of key concepts. We shift the focus from quantitatively evaluating the behavior of semiconductor devices to intuitively visualizing the semiconductor device actions.

Syllabus

Courses under this program:
Course 1: Introduction to Semiconductors, PN Junctions and Bipolar Junction Transistors

This online course uses engaging animations to help you visualize the operating principles of many common semiconductor devices. The course covers PN junctions, photodiodes, solar cells, light-emitting diodes, metal-semiconductor contact, and Bipolar Junction Transistors.

Course 2: Basics of Field Effect Transistors and Technology Scaling

This online course uses engaging animations to help you visualize the operating principles of many common semiconductor devices. The course covers MOSFET, MOS capacitors, charge-coupled devices, CMOS Active Pixel Sensor, FinFET, nanowire transistors, gate-all-around MOSFET and 2D transistors.

Courses

23 reviews
8 weeks, 2-4 hours a week, 2-4 hours a week
View details

This online course is the first part of the Principle of Semiconductor Devices Professional Certificate Program.

In this course, we will start with the fundamental concept of semiconductors as a tutorial for doping and the formation of PN junctions. Major and minority carrier currents in PN junctions under forward bias and reverse bias will be explained based on drift and diffusion physics. The course will further explain the operating principle of photodiodes, solar cells, light-emitting diodes (LED) and metal-semiconductor contact.

As an extension of PN junction theory, the concept will be extended to form bipolar junction transistors (BJT). The different operation modes of a BJT, including forward active, reverse active, saturation and cutoff under common emitter mode, will be introduced. The gain and amplifying mechanism of a BJT will be explained based on the carrier actions. The detailed behavior of the BJT will be summarized by a circuit model.
5 reviews
7 weeks, 4-5 hours a week, 4-5 hours a week
View details

This online course is the later part of the Principle of Semiconductor Devices Professional Certificate Program.

MOSFET as the most important component in integrated circuits will be introduced in this course. We will explain the basic operating principle of MOS capacitor and its application in charge-coupled devices (CCD) and CMOS Active Pixel Sensor (APS) in modern digital cameras.

Based on the MOS capacitor theory, different MOSFET operation regions, including strong inversion, subthreshold region, linear region, and saturation region, will be described. The deficiency of classical MOSFET theory and the need for more advanced mobility degradation and carrier velocity saturation theory will be elaborated.

To bridge the knowledge of transistors with practical applications, we will explain Moore’s Law and the approach to transistor scaling. Some specific features in modern MOSFETs including silicide, strain engineering, shallow junction, high-k gate dielectrics, metal gate stack, and their fabrication processes will be explained. The operating principle of advanced MOSFET structures, such as FinFET, nanowire transistors, gate-all-around MOSFET and 2D transistors, will also be introduced.