Minterm and maxterm are terms used in Boolean algebra to represent Boolean functions in their canonical forms. A minterm is a product term of a logical expression, where each variable appears exactly once either in true or false form, but not in both. It results in 1 for the output of a single cell and 0s for all other cells in a Karnaugh map or truth table. On the other hand, a maxterm is a sum term of a logical expression, where each variable appears exactly once either in true or false form, but not in both. It results in 0 for the output of a single cell and 1s for all other cells in a Karnaugh map or truth table. Minterms and maxterms are used to express Boolean functions in their canonical forms, and they are the basic building blocks for representing Boolean functions.