Abstract :
The present selection of papers only partly reflects the trends displayed at ESSCIRC. Some of the papers presented there have already appeared elsewhere, whilst others were not available in final form at press time, despite noble efforts on the part of the authors and reviewers. We would like to express our sincere thanks to them all for making this special feature possible. The papers included here cover a wide range of research and development work ranging from the application of device physics in voltage references at one end, to predictions of system behavior at the other. Many of the circuits are for special applications, e.g., low-power watch circuits, high speed computers, and radar amplifiers. Important problems concerning systems are addressed, namely testing of complex digital circuits and the influence of alpha particle induced errors on memory systems. We also have a contribution on analysis of thermal behavior of a circuit showing that the clever use of analysis produces adequate solutions without a large amount of numerical computation. Nevertheless, a number of conference contributions, notably on IC design aids and the use of uncommitted logic arrays, are not represented owing to difficult time schedules, but will doubtless appear in the near future. We hope, however, that the group of papers printed here will provide interest and stimulus to authors to prepare contributions for the ESSCIRC 1980 conference to be held in Grenoble, France.
