Unit-4 P-N Junction diodes
Review of semiconductor devices
A semiconductor device is an electronic component that uses the electronic properties
of semiconductor material, principally silicon, germanium, and gallium arsenide. Semiconductor
devices have replaced vacuum tubes in most applications. They use electrical conduction in
the solid state rather than the gaseous state or thermionic emission in a vacuum.
Semiconductor materials are useful because their behavior can be easily manipulated by the
addition of impurities, known as doping. Semiconductor conductivity can be controlled by:
The introduction of an electric or magnetic field,
By exposure to light
Exposure to heat,
By the mechanical deformation of a doped monocrystalline silicon grid;
Current conduction in a semiconductor occurs due to mobile or "free" electrons and electron
holes, collectively known as charge carriers. Doping a semiconductor with a small proportion
of an atomic impurity, such as phosphorus or boron, greatly increases the number of free
electrons or holes within the semiconductor.
When a doped semiconductor contains excess holes, it is called a p-type semiconductor (p for
positive electric charge); when it contains excess free electrons, it is called an n-type
semiconductor (n for negative electric charge). A majority of mobile charge carriers have
negative charge.
Formation of N-type and P- type semiconductors
Semiconductor materials like silicon and germanium have four electrons in their outer shell
(valence shell). All the four electrons are used by the semiconductor atom in forming bonds
with its neighboring atoms, leaving a low number of electrons available for conduction.
Pentavalent elements are those elements which have five electrons in their outer shell. When
pentavalent impurities like phosphorus or arsenic are added into semiconductor, four
electrons form bonds with the surrounding silicon atoms leaving one electron free.
The resulting material has a large number of free electrons. Since electrons are negative
charge carriers, the resultant material is called n-type (or negative type) semiconductor. The
pentavalent impurity that is added is called a 'dopant' and the process of addition is called
'doping' in simple the 8 electron is required to make a covalent bound and 1 electron remain
in outer most shell which start acting as a free electron.
The extrinsic p-Type Semiconductor is formed when a trivalent impurity is added to a
pure semiconductor in a small amount, and as a result, a large number of holes are created in
it. A large number of holes are provided in the semiconductor material by the addition of
trivalent impurities like Gallium and Indium. Such type of impurities which produces p-type
semiconductor are known as an Acceptor Impurities because each atom of them create one
hole which can accept one electron.
Formation of depletion region
Depletion region or depletion layer is a region in a P-N junction diode where no mobile
charge carriers are present. Depletion layer acts like a barrier that opposes the flow of
electrons from n-side and holes from p-side.
When the two semiconductors are joined, the electrons from the n-side are diffused to the p
region and they form a layer of negative charge on the p-side.
Similarly, the positive charges from the p-side are diffused to the n region and they form a layer
of positive charge on the n-side.The region between these two layers is the depletion region of
the semiconductor.
Forwad Bias condition
When a diode is connected in a Forward Bias condition, a negative voltage is applied to the N-
type material and a positive voltage is applied to the P-type material.
If this external voltage becomes greater than the value of the potential barrier, approx. 0.7 volts
for silicon and 0.3 volts for germanium, the potential barriers opposition will be overcome and
current will start to flow.
Reverse Bias condition
When a diode is connected in a Reverse Bias condition, a positive voltage is applied to the N-
side and a negative voltage is applied to the P-side
The positive voltage applied to the N-type material attracts electrons towards the positive
electrode and away from the junction, while the holes in the P-type end are also attracted away
from the junction towards the negative electrode.
The net result is that the depletion layer grows wider due to a lack of electrons and holes and
presents a high impedance path, almost an insulator. The result is that a high potential barrier is
created thus preventing current from flowing through the semiconductor material
This condition represents a high resistance value to the PN junction and practically zero current
flows through the junction diode with an increase in bias voltage. However, a very small leakage
current does flow through the junction which can be measured in micro-amperes, ( μA ).
V-I Characteristics of a P-N Junction diode
The characteristics can be explained under three conditions namely zero external
voltage, forward bias and reverse bias.
(i) Zero External Voltage or Zero bias:
When the external voltage is zero, i.e. circuit is open at K, the potential barrier at the junction
does not permit current flow. Therefore, circuit current is zero as indicated by point O in fig
(ii) Forward Bias:
With forward bias to the p-n junction i.e. p-type is connected to positive terminal and n-type is
connected to negative terminal, the potential barrier is reduced.
At some forward voltage (0.7 V for Si and 0.3 V for Ge), the potential barrier is altogether
eliminated and current starts flowing in the circuit. From now onwards, the current increases
with the increase in forward voltage. Thus a rising curve OB is obtained with forward bias as
shown in fig
From the forward characteristics, it is seen that at first (i.e region OA ), the current increase very
slowly and curve is non-linear. It is because the external applied voltage is used to overcome the
potential barrier.
However, once the external applied voltage exceeds the potential barrier voltage, the p-n junction
behaves like an ordinary conductor. Therefore, current rises very sharply with increase in
voltage (region AB). The curve is almost linear.
(iii) Reverse Bias:
With reverse bias to the p-n junction i.e. p-type connected to negative terminal and n-type
connected to positive terminal, potential barrier at the junction is increased. Therefore, the
junction resistance becomes very high and practically no current flows through the circuit.
However, in practice, a very small current (of the order of μA) flows in the circuit with reverse
bias as shown in fig. In n-type and p-type semiconductors, very small number of minority charge
carriers is present. Hence, a small voltage applied on the diode pushes all the minority carriers
towards the junction.
Thus, further increase in the external voltage does not increase the electric current. This electric
current is called reverse saturation current. In other words, the voltage or point at which the
electric current reaches its maximum level and further increase in voltage does not increase the
electric current is called reverse saturation current. The reverse saturation current depends on
the temperature. If temperature increases the generation of minority charge carriers increases.
Hence, the reverse current increases with the increase in temperature. However, the reverse
saturation current is independent of the external reverse voltage. Hence, the reverse saturation
current remains constant with the increase in voltage.
Diode current Equation
The Shockley diode equation or the diode law, named after transistor co-inventor William
Shockley of Bell Telephone Laboratories, gives the I–V (current-voltage) characteristic of an
idealized diode in either forward or reverse bias (applied voltage):
VD
I =I ( e )
nV T
s −1
where
I is the diode current,
IS is the reverse bias saturation current (or scale current),
VD is the voltage across the diode,
VT is the thermal voltage kT/q (Boltzmann constant times temperature divided by electron
charge), and
n is the ideality factor, also known as the quality factor
The equation is called the Shockley ideal diode equation when n, the ideality factor, is set equal
to 1. The ideality factor n typically varies from 1 to 2 (though can in some cases be higher),
depending on the fabrication process and semiconductor material and is set equal to 1 for the
case of an "ideal" diode (thus the n is sometimes omitted). The ideality factor was added to
account for imperfect junctions as observed in real transistors. The factor mainly accounts
for carrier recombination as the charge carriers cross the depletion region.
The thermal voltage VT is approximately 25.8563 mV at 300 K (27 °C; 80 °F). At an arbitrary
temperature, it is a known constant defined by:
KT
VT= Where k is the Boltzmann constant, T is the absolute temperature
q
of the p–n junction, and q is the magnitude of charge of an electron (the elementary charge).
Application of P-N Junction diode as LED
The lighting emitting diode is a p-n junction diode. It is a specially doped diode and made up of a
special type of semiconductors. When the light emits in the forward biased, then it is called as a
light emitting diode.
When Light Emitting Diode (LED) is forward biased, free electrons in the conduction band
recombines with the holes in the valence band and releases energy in the form of light.The
process of emitting light in response to the strong electric field or flow of electric current is
called electroluminescence. A normal p-n junction diode allows electric current only in one
direction. It allows electric current when forward biased and does not allow electric current when
reverse biased. Thus, normal p-n junction diode operates only in forward bias condition.
Like the normal p-n junction diodes, LEDs also operates only in forward bias condition. To
create an LED, the n-type material should be connected to the negative terminal of the battery
and p-type material should be connected to the positive terminal of the battery. In other words,
the n-type material should be negatively charged and the p-type material should be positively
charged.The construction of LED is similar to the normal p-n junction diode except that gallium,
phosphorus and arsenic materials are used for construction instead of silicon or germanium
materials.
In normal p-n junction diodes, silicon is most widely used because it is less sensitive to the
temperature. Also, it allows electric current efficiently without any damage. In some cases,
germanium is used for constructing diodes.However, silicon or germanium diodes do not emit
energy in the form of light. Instead, they emit energy in the form of heat. Thus, silicon or
germanium is not used for constructing LEDs.
Diode as a 7 segment display
The 7-segment display, consists of seven LEDs arranged in a rectangular fashion. Each of the
seven LEDs is called a segment because when illuminated the segment forms part of a numerical
digit (both Decimal and Hex) to be displayed. An additional 8th LED is sometimes used within
the same package thus allowing the indication of a decimal point, (DP) when two or more 7-
segment displays are connected together to display numbers greater than ten.
Each one of the seven LEDs in the display is given a positional segment with one of its
connection pins being brought straight out of the rectangular plastic package. These individually
LED pins are labelled from a through to g representing each individual LED. The other LED pins
are connected together and wired to form a common pin.
So by forward biasing the appropriate pins of the LED segments in a particular order, some
segments will be light and others will be dark allowing the desired character pattern of the
number to be generated on the display. This then allows us to display each of the ten decimal
digits 0 through to 9 on the same 7-segment display.
The displays common pin is generally used to identify which type of 7-segment display it is. As
each LED has two connecting pins, one called the “Anode” and the other called the “Cathode”,
there are therefore two types of LED 7-segment display called: Common Cathode (CC)
and Common Anode (CA).
The difference between the two displays, as their name suggests, is that the common cathode has
all the cathodes of the 7-segments connected directly together and the common anode has all the
anodes of the 7-segments connected together and is illuminated as follows.
1. The Common Cathode (CC) – In the common cathode display, all the cathode
connections of the LED segments are joined together to logic “0” or ground. The
individual segments are illuminated by application of a “HIGH”, or logic “1” signal via a
current limiting resistor to forward bias the individual Anode terminals (a-g).
Common Cathode 7-segment Display
2. The Common Anode (CA) – In the common anode display, all the anode connections of the
LED segments are joined together to logic “1”. The individual segments are illuminated by
applying a ground, logic “0” or “LOW” signal via a suitable current limiting resistor to the
Cathode of the particular segment (a-g).
Common Anode 7-segment Display
In general, common anode displays are more popular as many logic circuits can sink more
current than they can source. Also note that a common cathode display is not a direct
replacement in a circuit for a common anode display and vice versa, as it is the same as
connecting the LEDs in reverse, and hence light emission will not take place.
Depending upon the decimal digit to be displayed, the particular set of LEDs is forward biased.
For instance, to display the numerical digit 0, we will need to light up six of the LED segments
corresponding to a, b, c, d, e and f. Thus the various digits from 0 through9 can be displayed
using a 7-segment display as shown.
7-Segment Display Segments for all Numbers.
Then for a 7-segment display, we can produce a truth table giving the individual segments that
need to be illuminated in order to produce the required decimal digit from 0 through 9 as shown
below.
7-segment Display Truth Table
Individual Segments Illuminated
Decimal
Digit
a b c d e f g
0 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
1 0 1 1 0 0 0 0
2 1 1 0 1 1 0 1
3 1 1 1 1 0 0 1
4 0 1 1 0 0 1 1
5 1 0 1 1 0 1 1
6 1 0 1 1 1 1 1
7 1 1 1 0 0 0 0
8 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
9 1 1 1 0 0 1 1
