Word: germanium
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...Transistor is a slim metal cylinder about an inch long. Inside are two hair-thin wires whose points press, two-thousandths of an inch apart, on a pinhead of germanium. A feeble current in the "input" wire controls a much larger current flowing from the "output" wire. Such "amplification" is the essential property of vacuum tubes. The Transistor works on a different principle (by changing the conductivity of the germanium), but it amplifies the input current as much as 100 times...