From silicon to microchip and from microchip to underground contamination, a complex set of mutations occurs to enable the development of electronic technologies. In the process of microchip manufacture, silicon does not long remain in its raw state but is transformed from ingots of silicon into thin wafers and finally into minute electrical assemblages. These assemblages, microchips, are the hardware that facilitates the transfer of information in the form of electrical signals, or on-off signals. The transmission of information into bits, or binary units that correspond to electrical pulses, requires this composite of silicon, chemicals, metals, plastics, and energy. It would be impossible to separate the zeros and ones of information from the firing of these electrical pulses and the processed silicon through which they course. A miniature device that performs seemingly immaterial operations, the chip, in fact, requires a wealth of material inputs.