Shendi University

Faculty of Engineering & Architecture

Department of Electrical and Electronics
Engineering
Semiconductor Physics and Devices
Lecture 2

Electronic Transport in Semiconductors

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 Lecture Outline
❑Introduction
❑Electron-Hole Pair Interaction
❑ Constructure of Semiconductors
❑N-type Semiconductors
❑P-type Semiconductors
❑Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors
❑Applications
❑Advantages
❑Practice Problems

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 Introduction
❑In semiconductor electrons and holes are called
carriers, which moves from one position to another and
this movement of charge carriers is called carrier
transport.
❑In the absence of external field, the charge carrier
moves in random direction due to its thermal energy.
The path of the charge carrier changes due to scattering
by the vibration of the lattice points and by the coulomb
force of ionised donor and acceptor atoms in the
semiconductor.
❑when the charge carriers are subjected to external
fields, then they move with a velocity called drift
velocity, and reaches a steady state.
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 Electron-Hole Pair Interaction
❑ With free electrons breaking off covalent bonds, holes
are generated. Holes can be filled by absorbing other
free electrons, so effectively there is a flow of charge
carriers.
❑ bandgap energy determines how much effort is needed
to break off an electron from its covalent bond. There
exists an exponential relationship between the free-
electron density and bandgap energy.
❑ Pure Si can be doped with other elements to change its
electrical properties. For example, if Si is doped with
P (phosphorous), then it has more electrons, or
becomes type N (electron).
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 Electron-Hole Pair Interaction
❑If Si is doped with B (boron), then it has more holes, or
becomes type P.
❑ The process in which charge particles move because
of an electric field is called drift. Charge particles will
move at a velocity that is proportional to the electric
field.
❑The mathematical equation for calculating drift velocity is
𝑣𝑑 = 𝜇𝐸
where μ is the mobility of the charges and E is the electric
field.

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 Constructure of Semiconductors
❑ Intrinsic (Undoped)
✓Pure semiconductors are referred as intrinsic semiconductors
✓They consist almost equal number of holes and electrons
which are generated by themal excitation at finite temperature
✓Zero Kelvin they behave like insulators
❑ Extrinsic (Doped)
✓ Addition of impurities in controlled amounts would take
semiconductor performance into new dimensions
✓ Adding a small amount of electrons (or holes) would
dramatically change the transport properties of intrinsic
semiconductor
✓ Effect of doping (addition of either electron acceptors or
electron donors) will increase the densities of respective carriers
and hence the change in the conductivity
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 Constructure of Semiconductors
❑ Intrinsic semiconductors – Si and Ge (column IV of periodic
table)

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 Constructure of Semiconductors
Compound semiconductors
❑ Binary combinations of atoms of column III and column V and
some atoms from column II and VI.
❑ Ternary (three elements) compounds (GaAsP)
❑ Quaternary (four elements) InGaAsP

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 Constructure of Semiconductors
Compound semiconductors
❑III-V compound semiconductors include gallium arsenide
( GaAs), gallium nitride( GaN), indium gallium nitride( InGaN)
and indium phosphide( InP). These compound semiconductors
have much shorter switching speeds compared to
conventional silicon( Si) and can operate at higher voltages. They
can therefore be used in microelectronics and microwave
technology up to 100 GHz.
❑Gallium arsenide (GaAs) is used to make integrated circuits for
microwave technology, infrared LEDs, Gunn diodes, and Optical
Integrated Circuits (OIC) for integrated optics. Other
semiconductors compounds are used in optronics, photonics
and Photovoltaics. For example, in photoelectric sensors, optical
transmitters and receivers, solar modules, and various other
components.
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 N–type Semiconductors
❑ In 'n' type semiconductor the electrons are majority charge carriers and holes
are minority charge carriers. Apart from this, there will be equal number of
immobile positive ions (grey shaded) in n-type semiconductor.
❑ Due to field applied the electrons in the semiconductor move towards the
positive terminal and they disappear. At the same time equal number of
electrons are generated at the negative terminal.

❑ These electrons are attracted by

the immobile positive ions
present in the semiconductor
and therefore a continuous flow
of electrons from one terminal
to the other terminal takes place
through the semiconductor.
❑ The net current flow in the
semiconductor depends on the
biasing voltage.

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 N–type Semiconductors

❑When an intrinsic semiconductor is doped with pentavalent

elements such as
❑Phosphors the resulting conductor is a N-type semiconductor.
❑The Ge atom or the Si atom is having only 4 valence electrons.
The pentavalent atoms form four covalent bond with four parent
Ge or Si atom leaving one electron free for conductance.

❑Since the impurity atoms

donates an electron for
conductance, it is called donor
impurity or N-type impurity.

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 p–type Semiconductors
❑ In 'p' type semiconductor the holes are majority charge carriers and electrons
are minority charge carriers. Apart from this, there will be equal number of
immobile negative ions (grey shaded) in 'p'-type semiconductor.
❑ due to field applied, the holes move towards the negative terminal and they combine
with the electrons coming out from the negative terminal and disappears. At the same
time equal number of holes are generated near the positive terminal. These holes
attract the immobile negative ions present in the semiconductor towards the positive
terminal and thus causes current to flow.

❑ During this process an electron is lost by the

acceptor atom and therefore it try to get back
an electron from the adjacent atom to fill
that hole in the semiconductor. This process
continues and hole current occurs inside the
semiconductor.

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 p–type Semiconductors
❑When an intrinsic semiconductor is doped with trivalent
elements such as
❑Boron the resulting conductor is a P-type semiconductor.
❑The Ge atom or the Si atom is having only 4 valence electrons.
The boron atom form three covalent bond with three parent Ge
or Si atom the fourth bond constitutes a hole.

❑Since the trivalent impurity

which creates holes which
can accept electrons it is
known as acceptors or P-
type.

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 Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors
❑ Three primary types of carrier action occur inside
a semiconductor:

✓ Drift: charged particle motion under the influence of an

electric field.

✓ Diffusion: particle motion due to concentration gradient or

temperature gradient.

✓ Recombination-generation (RG)

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 Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors

❑In thermal equilibrium, the electrons are continually

being thermal generated from the valence band (hereby
holes are generated) to conduction band by the random
thermal process.
❑At the same time, electrons moving randomly through
the crystal may come in close proximity to holes and
recombine. The rate of generation and recombination of
electrons/holes are equal so the net electron and hole
concentrations are constant (independent of time).

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Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors
Conductivity Effective Mass, m*
❑Under the influence of an electric field (E-field), an electron
or a hole is accelerated:
electrons

holes

Electron and hole conductivity effective masses

mo = 9.110-31 kg
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Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors
Carrier Scattering
❑ Mobile electrons and atoms in the Si lattice are always in
random thermal motion.
Electrons make frequent collisions with the vibrating atoms
“lattice scattering” or “phonon scattering” – increases with
increasing T

❑Other scattering mechanisms:

deflection by ionized impurity atoms
deflection due to Coulombic force between carriers
“carrier-carrier scattering” – only significant at high carrier
concentrations
❑ The net current in any direction is zero, if no E-field is applied.

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 Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors
Carrier Drift
❑ When an electric field (e.g. due to an externally applied voltage)
exists within a semiconductor, mobile charge-carriers will be
accelerated by the electrostatic force: 2
3 1
4 electron
5

E
❑ Electrons drift in the direction opposite to the E-field → net
current
❑ Because of scattering, electrons in a semiconductor do not
undergo constant acceleration. However, they can be viewed
as quasi-classical particles moving at a constant average
drift velocity vdn
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Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors
Carrier Mobility, µ
For electrons: |vdn| = q 𝑬 τmn / mn* ≡ µn 𝑬

n  [qτmn / mn*] is the electron mobility

Similarly, for holes: |vdp|= q𝑬τmp / mp*  µp 𝑬

p  [q τmp / mp*] is the hole mobility
Electron and hole mobilities for intrinsic semiconductors @ 300K
Si Ge GaAs InAs
n (cm2/Vs) 1400 3900 8500 30,000
p (cm2/Vs) 470 1900 400 500
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Mobile Charge Carriers in Semiconductors

Example 2-1
Find the hole drift velocity in an intrinsic Si sample for
E = 103 V/cm.

Solution

vdp = pE = 470 × 103 = 4.7 105 𝑐𝑚/𝑠

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 Applications
✓ Computers, laptops Silicon (Si) MOSFETs, ICs, CMOS
✓ Smart phones, Cell Phones, pagers Si ICs, GaAs FETs, BJTs
✓ Storage devices (USB,CD players) AlGaAs and InGaP laser
diodes, Si photodiodes
✓ TV remotes, mobile terminals Light emitting diodes
(LEDs)
✓ Satellite dishes InGaAs MMICs (Monolithic Microwave
ICs)
✓ Fiber networks InGaAsP laser diodes, pin photodiodes
✓ Traffic signals, car GaN LEDs (green, blue)
✓ taillights InGaAsP LEDs (red, amber)
✓ Air bags Si MEMs, Si ICs

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 Advantages
❑ Some advantages of semiconductors, which make them highly
useful everywhere.
✓They are highly portable due to their small size
✓They require less input power
✓Semiconductor devices are shockproof
✓They have a longer lifespan
✓They are noise-free while operating
❑The physical and chemical properties of semiconductors make
them capable of designing technological wonders like
microchips, transistors, LEDs, solar cells, etc.
❑The microprocessor used for controlling the operation of space
vehicles, trains, robots, etc., is made up of transistors and other
controlling devices, which are manufactured by semiconductor
materials.
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 Practice Problems
1. Find the hole drift velocity in an intrinsic Si sample
for E = 104 V/cm

2. Find the hole drift velocity in an intrinsic Ge sample

for E = 103 V/cm

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Thank You

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