Semiconductors

The Transistor at 75

IEEE Spectrum: Seventy-five years is a long time. It’s so long that most of us don’t remember a time before the transistor, and long enough for many engineers to have devoted entire careers to its use and development. In honor of this most important of technological achievements, this issue’s package…

How the first transistor worked

IEEE Spectrum: The vacuum-tube triode wasn’t quite 20 years old when physicists began trying to create its successor, and the stakes were huge. Not only had the triode made long-distance telephony and movie sound possible, it was driving the entire enterprise of commercial radio, an industry worth more than a…

Egg-Crate Nanostructured PV Crosses Solar Threshold

IEEE Spectrum: By adding periodic nanostructures that look like egg-crate foam to tandem solar cells made of silicon and perovskites, researchers at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin in Germany have achieved a certified efficiency of 29.8 percent. This was the world record for…