Silicon chip

From Encyc

A silicon chip is a thin piece of silicon that contains millions of tiny transistors. These chips are used as processors for most modern computers. The technology to make them is quite advanced, involving tolerances of nanometers.

Silicon chips are manufactured in special dust-free facilities.

Every few years the number of transistors that can be crammed onto a silicon chip doubles. This is currently approaching a theoretical limit as the size of individual atoms is becoming a factor.