Integrated Circuit with Chip Art

Description (Brief):

Integrated circuits consist of electric components such as transistors, resistors, capacitors, and metallic interconnects manufactured at a nanometer scale on a silicon chip. Chip designers are constantly seeking to pack more components into less space making the engineering requirements of chip design almost an art. In the 1970s and early 1980s design engineers began to personalize their chip designs by leaving microscopic images etched inside the chips’ functioning design. These images took a variety of forms; company logos, funny animals, comic characters, or inside jokes between the engineering team. This hidden art helped to show that chip layers were correctly aligned and could prove that a competitor had stolen a chip design. Once chip designs were covered by copyright in 1984, chip art became a way for engineers to assert their individuality into the mass production of chip manufacturing.

Description (Brief)

This 21msp50/55/56 digital signal processor chip was created by Analog Devices Incorporated around 1994. The chip contains an image of a fire-breathing Godzilla.

Date Made: ca 1994

Maker: Analog Devices, Inc.

Location: Currently not on view

See more items in: Work and Industry: Electricity, Computers & Business Machines, American Stories exhibit

Exhibition:

Exhibition Location:

Credit Line: from Integrated Circuit Engineering Corporation, thru Glen R. Madland

Data Source: National Museum of American History

Id Number: 1996.3017.32Nonaccession Number: 1996.3017Catalog Number: 1996.3017.32

Object Name: integrated circuit

Physical Description: silicon (substrate material)Measurements: overall: .025 cm x 3.1 cm x 1 cm; in x 1 7/32 in x 13/32 in

Guid: http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746ad-56e6-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa

Record Id: nmah_1403255

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