Re: Ohm's Law

["Shapiro, Mark" <mshapiro@EXCHANGE.FULLERTON.EDU>]

Leigh,

        Transconductance has value with some of these new-fangled devices as
well, like field-effect transistors.  (When I first started teaching
electronics, I would explain field-effect transistors by saying that they
worked a lot like vacuum tubes.  Now I explain vacuum tube by saying they
work a lot like field-effect transistors.)

Mark Shapiro
http://www.IrasicbleProfessor.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Leigh Palmer [mailto:palmer@SFU.CA]
Sent: Tuesday, November 09, 1999 7:50 AM
To: PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu
Subject: Re: Ohm's Law


> > In the olden days it was dI/dV, the transconductance,
> > which served this function.
>
> I don't think a two-terminal device has a transconductance or a
> trans-anything.  Usually dI/dV is just called the small-signal conductance.

Quite right. Transconductance is/was a vacuum tube parameter
which would be inapplicable to any two terminal device.

Leigh