The cheap revolution is a first-order effect of Moore's Law. (Moore's Law predicts the transistor density on silicon chips will double every 18 to 24 months.) For years if you said "Moore's Law, " people presumed you were describing a future of ever more powerful computers.

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In the case of silicon, it's galloped for 41 years, ever since Fairchild Semiconductor and Texas Instruments shrunk a transistor from three dimensions into two and etched it in silicon.

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Instead of using light to etch a transistor circuit on a wafer of silicon, they propose to fabricate tiny wires.

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In 1959 Robert Noyce of Fairchild Semiconductor and Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments each invented the integrated circuit, etching a transistor onto a two- dimensional chip of silicon.

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Our romance with computer technology, or as I call it, silicon-based life forms, began in 1947 with the transistor.

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He shared a Nobel Prize with John Bardeen and Walter Brattain for the invention of the transistor and later went on to refine transistor technology, spawning the modern age of semiconductors and of Silicon Valley.

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To simplify (a lot) the tri-gate transistor allows power to flow over three surfaces of a tall and narrow silicon fin, rather than over a flat surface.

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