This reader-friendly guide shows you how to take charge of the newest, most versatile microcontrollers around, Atmels AVR RISC chip family. Inside, Electronics World writer and astronomy instrumentation developer Dhananjay V. Gadre walks you from first meeting these exciting new computers-on-a-chip all the way through design and ready-to-launch products. About The Author: This reader-friendly guide shows you how to take charge of the newest, most versatile microcontrollers around, Atmels AVR RISC chip family. Inside, Electronics World writer and astronomy instrumentation developer Dhananjay V. Gadre walks you from first meeting these exciting new computers-on-a-chip all the way through design and ready-to-launch products. About The Author: Dhananjay Gadre (Pune, India) is a Scientific Officer with the Instrumentation Program of the Inter-Univeristy Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune, India. He is now on leave from the IUCAA completing his Ph.D. at the Microelectronics Research and Communications Institute, EE Department, University of Idaho. Table of Contents Introduction. Microcontrollers. The AVR RISC Microcontroller Architecture. The AVR Instruction Set. The AVR Hardware Design Issues. Hradware and Software Interfacing with the AVR. Communication Links for the AVR Processor. AVR System Development Tools. Protyping Techniques. AVR Project 1: Smart Dice: A Dice with an Attitude. AVR Project 2: A Morse Keyer. AVR Project 3: A Simple Dual-Channel Voltmeter. AVR Project 4: The Ubiquitous Kitchen Timer. AVR Project 5: Radio Beacon Controller. AVR Project 6: AstroDat: A Stand-Alone Data Acquisition System. AVR Project 7: Security Dongle. AVR Project 8: A Pulse Frequency Counter with an RS-232 Interface. AVR Project 9: Sa-Re-Ga Follow Me: A Musical Toy. AVR Project 10: AVR Protoboard(tm) for Nuts(tm). Ideas for Projects.