logic gates

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A logic gate performs a logical operation on one or more logic inputs and produces a single logic output. The logic is called Boolean logic and is most commonly found in digital circuits. Logic gates are primarily implemented electronically using diodes or transistors, but can also be constructed using electromagnetic relays (relay logic), fluidic logic, pneumatic logic, optics, molecules, or even mechanical elements.

The simplest form of electronic logic is diode logic. This allows AND and OR gates to be built, but not inverters, and so is an incomplete form of logic. Further, without some kind of amplification it is not possible to have such basic logic operations cascaded as required for more complex logic functions. To build a functionally complete logic system, relays, valves (vacuum tubes), or transistors can be used. The simplest family of logic gates using bipolar transistors is called resistor-transistor logic (RTL). Unlike diode logic gates, RTL gates can be cascaded indefinitely to produce more complex logic functions. These gates were used in early integrated circuits. For higher speed, the resistors used in RTL were replaced by diodes, leading to diode-transistor logic (DTL). Transistor-transistor logic (TTL) then supplanted DTL with the observation that one transistor could do the job of two diodes even more quickly, using only half the space. In virtually every type of contemporary chip implementation of digital systems, the bipolar transistors have been rep...

Submitted by: nussy
Date Submitted: 12-25-2010
Category: Science
Words: 659
Pages: 2.64