Chip art, also known as silicon art, chip graffiti or silicon doodling, refers to microscopic artwork built into

integrated circuits An integrated circuit (IC), also known as a microchip or simply chip, is a set of electronic circuits, consisting of various electronic components (such as transistors, resistors, and capacitors) and their interconnections. These components a ...

, also called chips or ICs. Since ICs are printed by

photolithography Photolithography (also known as optical lithography) is a process used in the manufacturing of integrated circuits. It involves using light to transfer a pattern onto a substrate, typically a silicon wafer. The process begins with a photosensiti ...

, not constructed a component at a time, there is no additional cost to include features in otherwise unused space on the chip. Designers have used this freedom to put all sorts of artwork on the chips themselves, from designers' simple initials to rather complex drawings. Given the small size of chips, these figures cannot be seen without a

microscope A microscope () is a laboratory equipment, laboratory instrument used to examine objects that are too small to be seen by the naked eye. Microscopy is the science of investigating small objects and structures using a microscope. Microscopic ...

. Chip graffiti is sometimes called the hardware version of software easter eggs. Prior to 1984, these doodles also served a practical purpose. If a competitor produced a similar chip, and examination showed it contained the same doodles, then this was strong evidence that the design was copied (a

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive legal right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, ...

violation) and not independently derived. A 1984 revision of the US copyright law (the

Semiconductor Chip Protection Act of 1984 The Semiconductor Chip Protection Act of 1984 (or SCPA) is an act of the US Congress that makes the layouts of integrated circuits legally protected upon registration, and hence illegal to copy without permission. It is an integrated circuit ...

) made all chip masks automatically copyrighted, with exclusive rights to the creator, and similar rules apply in most other countries that manufacture ICs. Since an exact copy is now automatically a copyright violation, the doodles no longer serve useful purpose in terms of hardware watermarking.

Creating chip art

Integrated Circuits are constructed from multiple layers of material, typically

silicon Silicon is a chemical element; it has symbol Si and atomic number 14. It is a hard, brittle crystalline solid with a blue-grey metallic lustre, and is a tetravalent metalloid (sometimes considered a non-metal) and semiconductor. It is a membe ...

silicon dioxide Silicon dioxide, also known as silica, is an oxide of silicon with the chemical formula , commonly found in nature as quartz. In many parts of the world, silica is the major constituent of sand. Silica is one of the most complex and abundan ...

(

glass Glass is an amorphous (non-crystalline solid, non-crystalline) solid. Because it is often transparency and translucency, transparent and chemically inert, glass has found widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in window pane ...

), and

aluminum Aluminium (or aluminum in North American English) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Al and atomic number 13. It has a density lower than that of other common metals, about one-third that of steel. Aluminium has ...

. The composition and thickness of these layers give them their distinctive color and appearance. These elements created an irresistible palette for IC design and layout engineers. The creative process involved in the design of these chips, a strong sense of pride in their work, and an artistic temperament combined compels people to want to mark their work as their own. It is very common to find initials, or groups of initials on chips. This is the design engineer's way of "signing" their work. Often this creative artist's instinct extends to the inclusion of small pictures or icons. These may be images of significance to the designers, comments related to the chip's function,

inside jokes An in-joke, also known as an inside joke or a private joke, is a joke with humour that is understandable only to members of an ingroup; that is, people who are ''in'' a particular social group, occupation, or other community of shared interest. I ...

, or even

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual arts, visual, literature, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently Nonfiction, non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ...

references. Because of the difficulty in verifying their existence, chip art has also been the subject of online hoaxes (e.g. the never-seen " bill sux" comment on a

Pentium Pentium is a series of x86 architecture-compatible microprocessors produced by Intel from 1993 to 2023. The Pentium (original), original Pentium was Intel's fifth generation processor, succeeding the i486; Pentium was Intel's flagship proce ...

chip—the reputed "photo" showing the inscription is a hoax). The mass production of these works of art on the body of a commercial IC goes unnoticed by most observers and is discouraged by semiconductor corporations, primarily from the fear that the presence of the artwork (which is clearly unneeded) may interfere with some necessary function or design flow in the chip.The Secret Art of Chip Graffiti
''

IEEE Spectrum ''IEEE Spectrum'' is a magazine edited and published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. The first issue of ''IEEE Spectrum'' was published in January 1964 as a successor to ''Electrical Engineering''. In 2010, ''IEEE Spe ...

'' article on chip artwork, by H. Goldstein, Volume: 39, Issue: 3, Mar 2002, pp. 50-55. Some laboratories have started collaborating with artists or directly producing books and exhibits with the micrographs of these chips. Such is the case of

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...

chemist George Whitesides, who collaborated with pioneer photographer Felice Frankel to publish ''On the Surface of Things'', a highly praised photography book on experiments from (mostly) the Whitesides lab. Also, the laboratory of Albert Folch (who, perhaps not coincidentally, works in

BioMEMS Bio-MEMS is an abbreviation for biomedical (or biological) microelectromechanical systems. Bio-MEMS have considerable overlap, and is sometimes considered synonymous, with lab on a chip, lab-on-a-chip (LOC) and Total analysis system, micro total an ...

, the same field as George Whitesides) at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...

's Bioengineering Dept. has a highly popular online gallery with more than 1,700 free

-related chip art micrographs and has already produced three art exhibits in the Seattle area, with online sales.Folch Lab ART Webpage
/ref>

Notes

{{reflist

References

The Silicon Zoo
- A portion of the Molecular Expressions web site from Florida State University, containing pictures of hundreds of discovered chip artworks. The buffalo shown here is from this website.

External links

Yahoo directory
of chip art pages and articles.
Chipworks
An entire silicon art gallery found on the chips analysed by Chipworks.

* ttps://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D06EED81E3CF937A35750C0A96F958260 Art on the Head of a Microchip

Bruce Headlam Bruce Headlam is a Canadian journalist and the media desk editor of ''The New York Times'' since September 2008. He has reported in the several sections of the newspaper since 1998, including Circuits, Escapes and the '' Times Magazine''. Previo ...

, New York Times, 4 March 1999. Integrated circuits Visual arts genres Easter egg (media)

Creating chip art

Notes

References

See also

External links