Digital Electronics

This is a course at the introductory level on the design of digital electronic circuits. The topics are presented from a theoretical point of view and followed by practical examples.
The topics presented require basic knowledge of electronics.
The first section of the course is an introduction to the common problems of electronic systems (e.g. the distribution of power supplies, signals, etc.).
The second part concerns the basic formal and applicative methodologies of digital electronics. The illustrated circuits are to be considered as preparatory elements in order to learn the remaining parts of the course.
In the third part of the course, more complex digital circuits are described with a focus on digital circuits with memory elements and with criteria for synchronizing operations between the various components of the circuits.
The fourth part of the course delves into a subclass of digital circuits, necessary for the operation of semiconductor memories.

At the end of the course, students will be able to:
1. Represent digital electronic systems with a top-down approach
2. Understand the design flow of complex digital electronic systems
3. Understand the physical problems of signal interconnections and how to address them
4. Understand the basic elements of Boolean algebra applied to the study of combinatorial logical circuits
5. Analyze and synthesize combinatorial logical circuits
6. Understand logical-arithmetic unit (ALU) circuit patterns
7. Understand the working principle of the MOS transistors
8. Understand and design logical port circuit patterns using CMOS devices
9. Understand and use the number representation systems most commonly used in digital electronics
10. Understand and design simple sequential logical circuits
11. Understand how basic memory elements, such as the bi-stable element, flip-flops, etc., work.
12. Understand and synthesize simple state machines
13. Understand and describe the basic architecture of the Personal Computer
14. Understand the basic characteristics and performance of volatile and non-volatile memory circuits
15. Understand how the main types of memory works: registers in CMOS, SRAM, DRAM, EPROM, FLASH, etc.