An exploration of the positive and negative effects of technology on society, via diverse criteria to assess the relative well being of individuals and society; an examination of how society can help shape the future of technology and the tools that can be used to make wise technology choices.

What makes a technology socially responsible? At UMD, the Fearless Ideas campaign asks us to aim our enthusiasm for technology at big real problems. At the same time, we are coming to appreciate the increasingly complex nature of technological systems as they become integrated into all forms of infrastructure, we realize they may be unpredictable, interdependent on social and biological systems, and have unintended consequences. In this midst of this complexity, people make decisions with far reaching impacts. How then do we follow our passion for technology and innovation but also stay skeptical in a way that allows us to consider the potential and shortcomings of technology? Designed for both engineering and non-engineering students wishing to explore and assess the impact of engineering technology on society and the role of society in generating that technology.

Design, analysis, simulation, construction and evaluation of electric circuits. Terminal Relationships. Kirchoff's laws. DC and AC steady state analysis. Node and mesh methods. Thevenin and Norton equivalent circuits. Transient behavior of first- and second-order circuits. Frequency response and transfer functions. Ideal op-amp circuits. Diode and transistor circuits.

The design and analysis of combinational and synchronous sequential systems comprising digital logic gates and flip-flop memory devices; underlying tools such as switching and Boolean algebras and Karnaugh map simplification of gate networks; design and use of decoders, multiplexers, encoders, adders, registers, counters, sequence recognizers, programmable logic arrays (PLAs), read-only memories (ROMS, PROMS), and similar devices. Arbitrary radix conversion.

Concept of linear systems, state space equations for continuous systems, time and frequency domain analysis of signals and linear systems. Fourier, Laplace and Z transforms. Application of theory to problems in electrical engineering.

Axioms of probability; conditional probability and Bayes' rules; random variables, probability distribution and densities: functions of random variables: weak law of large numbers and central limit theorem. Introduction to random processes; correlation functions, spectral densities, and linear systems. Applications to noise in electrical systems, filtering of signals from noise, estimation, and digital communications.

Structure and organization of digital computers. Registers, memory, control and I/O. Data and instruction formats, addressing modes, assembly language programming. Elements of system software, subroutines and their linkages.

The electromagnetic spectrum: Review of Maxwell's equations; the wave equation potentials, Poynting's theorem, relationship between circuit theory and fields; propagation of electromagnetic waves in homogeneous media and at interfaces; transmission line theory, waveguides, radiation and antennas.

Examination of analog and digital device models for analysis, design, and simulation of transistor level electronic circuits, emphasizing Metal Oxide Silicon Field Effect Transistors (MOSFETs); fundamental single transistor configurations; frequency response, feedback, and stability of multi-transistor circuits, such as current mirrors, differential amplifiers, voltage references, operational amplifiers and data converters; complementary Metal Oxide Silicon (CMOS) implementations of static and clocked digital as well as mixed signal circuits.