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Comment by pjc50

7 hours ago

> I still don't really get transistors :P,

The important bits here are:

- any two conductive plates close together with an insulator between make a capacitor (1)

- when a capacitor is charged, the energy goes into the electric FIELD

- that's the FIELD of the field effect transistor

- if the field is strong enough, that causes conduction between source and drain (along the "channel")

- the insulator is nanometers thick, so current leaks across it; at that scale, you can detect individual electrons quantum teleporting straight through it.

(1) technically like gravity there is a capacitance between any two objects in the universe, but it's only significant when you have relatively wide and close conductors