Elements of Semiconductors (ELE142)

Lecture #5 : Diode Applications

Associate Prof. Dr. Islam Mansour

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 Course Outlines
• Introduction ➔ Basics of semiconductor physics, Atomic structure, energy bands,
types of materials, and materials used in Electronics
• Semiconductor ➔ Intrinsic Semiconductors, Doped Semiconductors and Current
Flow in Semiconductors (drift current ‐ diffusion current)
• PN junction, Modeling Circuits of Diode ➔ Diode IV characteristics
• Diode Applications ➔ Linear Power Supply, Rectifiers, Clipping circuits, Clamping
Circuits, multipliers
• Special-purpose Diodes ➔ Light emitting diodes, photo diodes, Zener diode,
Varactor Diode, Schottky diode and PIN diode
• Basics of Bipolar Junction Transistors (BJT) ➔ Physical operations, characteristics,
DC and AC characteristics and Applications
• Printed Circuit Fabrication Techniques
• Field Effect Transistors (FET)
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 Quick revision
Waveform of the circuit assuming practical model for the diode.

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Rectifier circuits

✓Half-Wave Rectifiers

✓Full-Wave Rectifiers
➢ Center-Tapped Full-Wave Rectifier

➢ Bridge Full-Wave Rectifier

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 Full-Wave Rectifiers
• A full-wave rectifier allows unidirectional (one-way) current through
the load during the entire 360o of the input cycle, while a half-wave
rectifier allows current through the load only during one-half cycle.

Full-wave rectification
The average value, (measured on a dc voltmeter), for a full-wave rectified
sinusoidal voltage is twice that of the half-wave

VAVG is approximately 63.7% of Vp

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 Center-Tapped Full-Wave Rectifier Operation
• A center-tapped rectifier is a type of full-wave rectifier that uses two
diodes connected to the secondary of a center-tapped transformer

Transfer characteristic assuming a

constant-voltage-drop model for
the diodes

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Basic operation of a center-tapped full-wave rectifier

Output waveform assuming a

constant-voltage-drop model for
the diodes

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 Effect of the Turns Ratio on the Output Voltage

• If the transformer’s turns ratio is 1

• Peak value of the rectified output voltage equals half the
peak value of the primary input voltage less the barrier
potential

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 Effect of the Turns Ratio on the Output Voltage (Cont.)

• If the transformer’s turns ratio is 2

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Peak Inverse Voltage of Center-Tapped Full-Wave Rectifier

• PIV=2VS - VON
VS-VON

PIV

-VS VS-VON

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Rectifier circuits

✓Half-Wave Rectifiers

✓Full-Wave Rectifiers
➢ Center-Tapped Full-Wave Rectifier

➢ Bridge Full-Wave Rectifier

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 Bridge Full-Wave Rectifier Operation
• The bridge rectifier uses four
diodes

• + Ve half-cycle ➔D1 and D2

are ON.

• - Ve half-cycle ➔D3 and D4

are ON.

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Bridge Output Voltage

Input and output waveforms

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 Peak Inverse Voltage of Bridge Full-Wave Rectifier
𝑣𝑠 = 𝑉𝐷1,𝑓𝑤𝑑 + 𝑉𝐷3,𝑟𝑣𝑟 𝑉𝐷3,𝑟𝑣𝑟 = 𝑣𝑠 − 𝑉𝐷1,𝑓𝑤𝑑

Input and output waveforms

Most popular FWR
Center-tapped winding is not required
Less secondary winding
Less PIV

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 Rectifier with a Filter Capacitor

• Filter is used to eliminate the fluctuations in the output voltage of a

half-wave or full-wave rectifier.
• Filtering is necessary because electronic circuits require a constant
source of dc voltage.
• Filters are implemented with capacitors.

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 Rectifier with a Filter Capacitor—The Peak Rectifier

+ +
V↑ V↓ Ideal diode model
- -
Charging Discharging

Practical diode model

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 Rectifier with a Filter Capacitor—The Peak Rectifier (cont.)

+
V↓ During the diode-off interval, vO can be expressed as
-

Discharging time constant(𝜏)=RC

𝑡
𝑒𝑥 ≅ 1 + 𝑥 𝑊ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑥 ≪ 1 𝑉0 ≅ 𝑉𝑝 (1 − )
𝑅𝐶
𝑉𝑝
𝑦 = 𝑚𝑥 + 𝐶 ∴ 𝑚(𝑆𝑙𝑜𝑝𝑒) = −
∆𝑦 𝑉𝑟 𝑅𝐶
From the curve: 𝑆𝑙𝑜𝑝𝑒 = − =− 𝑉𝑟 𝑉𝑝
∆𝑥 𝑇 ∴− =−
𝑇 𝑅𝐶
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 Rectifier with a Filter Capacitor—The Peak Rectifier (cont.)
Full-wave peak rectifier

Waveforms in the full-wave peak rectifier

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Filters

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Capacitor-Input Filter

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Capacitor-Input Filter (Cont.)

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 Ripple Voltage
• The variation in the capacitor voltage due to the charging
and discharging is called the ripple voltage.
• Generally, ripple is undesirable.

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Comparison of ripple voltages for half and full-wave

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 Ripple Factor
• The ripple factor (r) is an indication of the effectiveness
of the filter and is defined as

Where Vr(pp) is the peak-to-peak ripple voltage and VDC is the

dc (average) value of the filter’s output voltage

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 Ripple Factor (Cont.)
• The ripple factor can be lowered by increasing the value
of the filter capacitor or increasing the load resistance.

Then, if RL or C increases, the ripple voltage decreases and the

dc voltage increases

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 Example
• Determine the ripple factor for the filtered bridge
rectifier with a load as indicated in the figure

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Solution

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 End of Lecture

Best Wishes

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