Topic outline

  • Welcome to the "Electronic Circuits" course!

    ANNOUNCEMENT: Due to high demand, some classrooms have changed. The second session on Tuesday, 28.02.2023, will be in room U7, building Otakaari 1. For the other sessions, refer to the classroom update section.

    IMPORTANT: ALL STUDENTS PARTICIPATE IN ALL SESSIONS (MONDAYS AND TUESDAYS); THERE IS ONLY ONE GROUP. EVERYONE MUST COME TO THE FIRST SESSION OF THIS COURSE (27.02.2023)
    (Don't mind the groups in MyCourses; everyone comes for XXL1 and XXL2)

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    Scroll down to have all info about the course!

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    Wishing to get fundamental knowledge to start understanding (and hopefully soon start designing) modern electronic equipment, including sensor interfaces, data converters, and computers? In this case, Electronic Circuits is an essential course for you! In this course, we will detail basic design mechanisms for (a) analog circuits, such as amplifiers and filters, (b) digital circuits, from gates to small computers, and (c) data converters interfacing both analog and digital worlds.


    General description of an electronic system

    DISCLAIMER This course is considered to be the continuation course of "Basics in Electronics" from last autumn semester (ELEC-C9610). Hence lectures and exercises are the continuations of the ones from "Basics in Electronics". Students starting this course are expected to have a background covered in ELEC-C9610 or equivalent as a prerequisite. Therefore, the course is primarily intended for students in the "Digital Systems and Design (DSD)" bachelor program, but other students are also welcome to attend, given the prerequisite. However, students of the bachelor program in Electrical Engineering who have Electronics and Electrical Engineering as a major (EST) are not allowed to include the course in their degree as this course is considered redundant with other courses in their major.

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    Summary of our rules in this course

    • The course is organized around 4 main activities (see details by clicking on each activity): Lecture and in-class group work, Exercise assignment, Simulation assignment, and Discussion session with reflective assignments.
    • There is no final exam, but the evaluation is made by earning points for every activity. Grades are calculated regarding the number of points accumulated during the course (see Grading and study efforts).
    • The total course duration is 14 weeks, but some have reduced or no activities (public holidays, spring holidays, Vappu). See Course plan. Deadlines will be reminded to you by Email weekly. 
    • Every typical week of this course has (see Course plan) :
    1. One pre-task needs to be completed before each lecture. The pre-task must be submitted the day before the lecture (typically Monday evening). To favor discussion, a Zulip chat has been set up for the course. You can ask questions and discuss the week's topics there ( https://elec-circuits-2023.zulip.aalto.fi ).
    2. One lecture and in-class group work, or one discussion session (Tuesdays from 14:00 to 16:00 FOR ALL). Lectures are assumed to continue the "Basics in Electronics" course. Before every lecture, the Coursebook will contain the lecture materials (you can print them in pdf directly if needed).
    3. One return session for the exercise assignment (Mondays 10:15 to 12:00 FOR ALL). You will have a 15min time slot reserved to return and/or discuss your exercises with the teachers. There is a 6-day gap between a given lecture and the corresponding exercise assignment deadline to give you time to perform the assignment but not overlap with the following lecture. Please note that participating in the exercise return session is mandatory to have your exercise graded.
    • Additionally, three extra simulation assignments are planned along the course to give you practical experience with the simulator software KiCad.
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    Intended learning outcomes (ILO)

    • ILO1 – After the "AC analysis and power" part of the course (Weeks 1-2), students will be able to interpret quantities such as amplitude, phase, frequency, magnitude, or power to perform Alternating Current (AC) analysis on simple circuits. This will be assessed with exercise assignments.
    • ILO2 – After the "Frequency analysis and filters" part (Week 3-4), students will be able to interpret quantities such as poles, zeros, and resonance. They will apply this to perform frequency analysis through transfer functions and be able to build basic filters (orders 1 and 2 mostly). This will be assessed through exercise assignments and one simulation assignment.
    • ILO3 – In the "Analog versus digital circuits and introduction of MOS transistor" part (Weeks 5,8), students will clarify the main differences between analog and digital circuits. They will also interpret how the MOS transistor works. This will be assessed through exercise assignments.
    • ILO4 – After the "digital circuits and basic processor architecture" part (Weeks 9,10), students will be able to analyze basic binary and digital circuits (logic gates, latches, multiplexers, adders, etc.). They will also be able to describe a simple processor's main blocks. This will be assessed through exercise assignments and one simulation assignment.
    • ILO5 – After the "systems and data converter" part (Week 11-13), students will be introduced to basic concepts and circuits performing data conversion. They will have an intuitive understanding of concepts such as quantization and sampling and be able to describe basic data converter topologies. This will be assessed through exercise assignments and one simulation assignment.
    • ILO6 – In addition, after the course, students can interpret the main blocks of modern electronic systems and identify their general role. This will be assessed through the last reflective assignment on systems in week 14. 
    • ILO7 – Students will also practice their communication skills in exercise return sessions and discussion sessions and be able to communicate with an international group of teachers and students. This will not be formally assessed but practiced throughout the course.