Mr.

Kanisorn Khuphiran Student ID 6234203723 1

The determination of the basic proportion h/e using LEDs

Mr. Kanisorn Khuphiran

Student ID 6234203723

The proportion of two fundamental physical constants: planck’s constant (h) and the
value of an electronic charge (e) is an important factor that characterizes the working of light
emitting diode (LED) and many quantum mechanical phenomena that involves charged
particles and photons. In this experiment, the proportion h/e will be determined by
conducting two measurements of 4 different LEDs. First, the threshold voltage of a LED will
be approximated by finding the x-intercept in I-V characteristics curve of the LED. Second,
the wavelength of the LED will be estimated using the diffraction method. Lastly, the
proportion h/e will be estimated using the linear regression of threshold voltages and the
inverse of the corresponding wavelengths. The h/e found by this method is accurate with
about 15% deviation from the accepted value and precise with about 12% deviation from
the mean value.
Keywords: light emitting diode, threshold voltage, diffraction grating

1. INTRODUCTION come into contact, a p-n junction is formed. Due to the

Light emitting diode is a common p-n junction different amounts of charge carriers in each side of a p-
device. Its light phenomenon is easily described using n junction, there will be diffusion of charge carriers with
quantum theory of light. For this reason, it is commonly net holes’ current to the negative side and net
used to familiarize novice experimenter with electronic current to the positive side. At equilibrium,
fundamental theory or constants associating with the the electric field opposing any drifting currents is
theory. established in a small region called depletion region.
Built-in voltage is dubbed to referred to voltage
1.1 Theory difference of the depletion region’s bounds. Unless
LED is a semiconductor device consisting of two there is an external voltage that canceled out the built-
differently doped semiconductors. The positively doped in voltage, no current will flow through the diode. The
semiconductor contains more positive charge minimum voltage (in forward bias mode) that makes
carriers(holes) than the negative ones(electrons) and current flow through the diode is called threshold
vice versa. When two differently doped semiconductors voltage and is equal to the built-in voltage.
2 Mr. Kanisorn Khuphiran Student ID 6234203723

And its error: (4)

However, in the case where the size of error box of
each data points is larger than the standard deviation of
the distance from each data points to the linear trend
line, the error box is used to estimated the error for the
slope.
(5)
where m is the slope of linear trend line for the plot
Figure 1: A band diagram of p-n junction device; An electron of y vs. x and N is the number of data points.
recombines with a hole and emits light of the same energy Two quantities per LED are required for a data
as the energy gap, Eg point according to the above linear regression scheme.
As shown in the figure 1, when an electron in the One is threshold voltage of a LED which is found in the
conduction band of n-type semiconductor is drifted due I-V characteristics curve as a minimum voltage that
to the external voltage to the p-side, electron is very drives the current in forward bias mode. Another one is
likely to recombine with the hole in the p-side due to it an inverse wavelength of a LED which Is to be
being the major charge carrier. In this process, electron estimated using diffraction described below.
emits a quantum of light that is equal to the energy gap
of the p-type semiconductor. In this experiment,
threshold voltage times an electronic charge is equal to
the energy gap(this is approximately correct to the first
decimal of eV for most LEDs). Because energy of a
quantum of light is equal to the energy gap, so,
(1)
where V0 is the threshold voltage of a LED, Figure 2: A Fraunhofer diffraction of a reflection grating
λ is the wavelength of the LED, When a source emits a coherent light incidented on
c is the speed of light (3.0 × 108 m/s), a far-away diffraction grating and then diffracted before
h is the planck’s constant (6.626 × 10-34 Js) and projected on a far-away screen, each light wave can be
e is the charge of an electron (1.602 × 10-19 C). approximated as a plane wave. This approximated
This equation can be rewritten to suit the linear diffraction scheme is called Fraunhofer diffraction. In
regression method. figure 2, the path difference is
(6)
(2)
The condition in which the bright line occurs is
Hence, linear regression can be done when V0 is treated (7)
as y and 1/ λ is treated as x. The proportion h/e can be where d is the width of the grating’s slit,
estimated from the resulting slope. θ is the angular distance from the optical line
(3) to the m-th bright line and λ is the wavelength of light.
 Mr. Kanisorn Khuphiran Student ID 6234203723 3

In the experiment, grating is usually called by its to monitor LED’s current from input A and LED’s
number of slits per millimeters and translational voltage from input B. Refer to figure 3 for the
distance is measured instead of the angular distance. connection scheme and online documentation† for
So, to suit the experiment, the equation is rewritten as program setup. Set the input A’s upper bound to 20mA.
Set the program to record the input A and B for every
(8)
voltage’s change of 0.005 mV.
where n is the grating no. in unit of lines/mm.
2. Connect a voltage-current regulator to a
Hence, for first order (m=1), the wavelength of light
220V/50Hz AC voltage supply. Make sure that voltage’s
from a LED when put as the source is
current’s control knob are turned to the leftmost to
(9) prevent electrical overload. Switch the regulator on.
and its error propagated from measured x and y is Connect its output to drive a LED in forward-bias mode
(refer to figure 3). Slowly turn the current’s control knob
(10) a little to the right. This will allow the current to flow.
3. In the CASSY LAB, click the clock icon or press
2. EXPERIMENT “F9” to start recording the inputs. Slowly turn the
The experiment consists of two parts: measurement voltage knob until the current reached 10-20mA. Click
of a threshold voltage and measurement of a the clock icon again or press “F9” to stop recording.
wavelength of the same LED. Two measurements are 4. Copy table in the left tab to the EXCEL program.
done consecutively for a single LED and then repeated Find the point where any current emerge. Record the
for another LED until it counts to 4 different LEDs. threshold voltage as the voltage at that point.
2.1 Measurement of a threshold voltage of a LED 2.2 Measurement of a wavelength of a LED

Figure 4: The diffraction pattern leveled with the ruler scale

on the screen
1. Setup the equipment as shown in figure 2. Posits
the screen as far as possible from the grating.
2. Turn on a LED by slowly adjusting the voltage
knob on the regulator. Beware not to turn the voltage
too high or else the light will be intense and is
uncomfortable to observe for some time.
Figure 3: A connection scheme for monitoring voltage and 3. Gaze through a diffraction grating for a diffraction
current of a LED pattern on the screen. Adjust the grating position to
1. Using a cannon plug, connect the Leybold have the pattern leveled with the ruler scale as shown
GmbH’s sensor-CASSY box to the 12V AC/DC voltage in figure 4. Record the distance between 1st order and -
supply. Connect the sensor box to a computer via USB 1st order bright line. Divide it by two and record the
port. Open CASSY LAB software on a computer. Setup result as y. Redo the y-measurement for 3 times.

† online documentation for CASSY LAB software is accessible from https://www.ld-didactic.de/software (updated: Nov 2023)
4 Mr. Kanisorn Khuphiran Student ID 6234203723

4. Change the grating no. and redo 3. that errors in a large part are come from the
3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION wavelengths which could be resulted from the width of
Table 1: Wavelengths and threshold voltages of 4 LEDs the bright lines. Threshold voltage’s error is relatively
λ / nm λ-1 / nm-1 V0 / V small due to small sampling period.
mean error mean error mean error 4. CONCLUSIONS
633 14 0.00158 0.00004 1.74 0.01 The basic proportion h/e is associated in many
574 14 0.00174 0.00004 1.85 0.01 quantum phenomena that consists of light photons and
450 14 0.00222 0.00007 2.62 0.01 charge particles. In this experiment, we estimate the
405 14 0.00247 0.00009 2.96 0.01 value of the proportion h/e by exploiting the fact that,
In the figure 5, three lines are drawn to approximate in p-n junction device, drifted electron in p-type emits
the mean trend line and its error. The mean slope is photon with the same excited energy as electron when
1428 V · nm. The minimum and maximum slope are recombined with the hole. When the excited energy is
1275 V · nm and 1611 V · nm respectively. Hence, the estimated to be electronic charge times a threshold
slope error is (1611-1275)/2 = 168 V · nm. Then, the voltage of a LED. It presents a linear relationship
proportion h/e is calculated using equation 3 and 4. between threshold voltage and inverse wavelength. The
linear regression is done to estimate slope and its error.
And the proportion h/e is calculated from the slope. It
is found that the acquired h/e by this method is
(4.76±0.56)×10-15 V · s. It has accuracy and precision of
85 and 88 percents respectively.
The error can come from the finite size of the bright
line making it imprecise to determine distance of 1st and
-1st order of bright line. A collimator or lens may be
used to address this issue. The threshold voltage’s error
can be made smaller by setting the sampling period to
be smaller.

Figure 5: Linear relationship between threshold voltages and

inverse wavelength of 4 different LEDs; linear trend lines are 1. Kittel, Charles (1976). Introduction to solid state physics (5th
drawn for maximum(red), mean(black) and minimum(green) ed.). New York: Wiley. ISBN 978-0-471-49024-1. OCLC
slope; equation on the top left corner is of black line. 908887143.
Hence, the proportion h/e is (4.76±0.56)×10-15 V · s. The 2. Gautreau, R.; Savin, W. (1999). Schaum's Outline of Modern
Physics (2nd ed.). McGraw-Hill. ISBN 0-07-024830-3.
value is close to the accepted value of 4.14×10-15 V · s.
3. Fromhold, A. T. (1991). Quantum Mechanics for Applied
The error is (4.76-4.14)/4.14 × 100% = 15% and the Physics and Engineering. Courier Dover Publications. ISBN 978-
deviation is 56/476 × 100% = 12%. In Table 1, it shows 0-486-66741-6.