Tetrode transistor
Transistor with four active terminals
title: "Tetrode transistor" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["transistor-types"] description: "Transistor with four active terminals" topic_path: "general/transistor-types" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrode_transistor" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Transistor with four active terminals ::
Early tetrode transistors
There were two types of tetrode transistor developed in the early 1950s as an improvement over the point-contact transistor and the later grown-junction transistor and alloy-junction transistor. Both offered much higher speed than earlier transistors.
- Point-contact transistor having two emitters. It became obsolete in the mid-1950s.
- Modified grown-junction transistor or alloy-junction transistor having two connections at opposite ends of the base.{{cite book | last = Wolf | first = Oswald |author2=R. T. Kramer |author3=J. Spiech |author4=H. Shleuder | title = Special Purpose Transistors: A Self-Instructional Programmed Manual | publisher = Prentice Hall | year = 1966 | pages = 98–102}} It achieved its high speed by reducing the input to output capacitance. It became obsolete in the early 1960s with the development of the diffusion transistor.
Modern tetrode transistors
- Dual-emitter transistor, used in two-input transistor–transistor logic gates
- Dual-collector transistor, used in two-output integrated injection logic gates
- Diffused planar silicon bipolar junction transistor, used in some integrated circuits. This transistor, apart from the three electrodes (emitter, base, and collector), has a fourth electrode or grid made of conducting material placed near the emitter-base junction from which it is insulated by a silica layer.
- Field-effect tetrode
References
References
- {{US patent. 4143421 - ''Tetrode transistor memory logic cell'', March 6, 1979. Filed September 6, 1977.
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