ELECTRICAL

ENGINEERING MATERIALS

EEE 242

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 Content

 What is a Transistor?
 Evolution of transistor
 Importance of transistor
 Definition & transistor types
 Transistor symbol & operation
 Applications of transistor
 Latest in transistor technology
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 Outcome

 Describe forward and reverse bias characteristics of diodes

 Explain voltage-current characteristics of semiconductor devices.
 Recognize NPN and PNP transistors.
 Define and identify types of transistor, symbols and operation
 Where are they applied
 Explain transistor biasing.
 Explain the operation of JFET, MOSFET, and UJTs.
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 What is a Transistor?
 Semiconductors: ability to change from conductor to insulator
 Can either allow current or prohibit current to flow
 Used as a switch, but also as an amplifier
 Essential part of many technological advances

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 History
 Before transistors were invented, circuits used vacuum tubes:
 Fragile, large in size, heavy, generate large quantities of heat, require a large amount
of power.
 In 1906, an American inventor and physicist, Lee De Forest, made the vacuum
tube triode or audion as he called it.
 Used in early computers
 Used in radios

 The first transistors were created at Bell Telephone Laboratories in 1947

 William Shockley, John Bardeen, and Walter Brattain created the transistors in an
effort to develop a technology that would overcome the problems of tubes.
 The first patents for the principle of a field effect transistor were registered in 1928
by Julius Lillenfield.
 The word “transistor” is a combination of the terms “transconductance” and
“variable resistor”
 Today an advanced microprocessor can have as many as 1.7 billion transistors.
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 Background Science
Conductors Insulators
Ex: Metals Ex: Plastics
Flow of electricity Flow of electricity
governed by motion governed by motion of
of free electrons ions that break free
As temperature As temperature
increases, increases, conductivity
conductivity increases due to lattice
decreases due to more
lattice atom collisions vibrations breaking free
of electrons ions
Idea of Irrelevant because
superconductivity conductive temperature
beyond melting point

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 Semiconductors
Semiconductors are more like insulators in their
pure form but have smaller atomic band gaps.
Adding dopants allows them to gain conductive
properties.

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 Doping
• Foreign elements are added to the semiconductor to make it
electropositive or electronegative
• P-type semiconductor (positive type)
• Dopants include Boron, Aluminum, Gallium, Indium, and Thallium
• Ex: Silicon doped with Boron
• The boron atom will be involved in covalent bonds with three of the
four neighboring Si atoms. The fourth bond will be missing and
electron, giving the atom a “hole” that can accept an electron

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 Doping
N-type semiconductor (negative type)
Dopants include Nitrogen, Phosphorous, Arsenic, Antimony, and
Bismuth
Ex: Silicon doped with Phosphorous
The Phosphorous atom will contribute an additional electron to the
Silicon giving it an excess negative charge

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P-N Junction Diodes
Forward Bias Forward biasing of a P-N
Current flows from P to N junction takes place when the
polarity of the source voltage is
+ve to the P material and -ve to
the N material.
This condition causes a
current flow.
The depletion zone of the
device is reduced and majority
current carriers are driven
toward the junction.

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 P-N Junction Diodes
Reverse Bias Reverse biasing of a P-N junction
No Current flows takes place when the polarity of the
source voltage is -ve to the P
Excessive heat can cause dopants in a material and +ve to the N material.
semiconductor device to migrate in
either direction over time, degrading This condition does not ordinarily
diode permit current flow.
Ex: Dead battery in car from rectifier The width of the depletion zone is
short increased by this action and
minority current carriers move
Ex: Recombination of holes and toward the junction.
electrons cause rectifier open circuit
and prevents car alternator form
charging battery

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First Transistor

 In 1947, John Bardeen and

Walter Brattain made the first
"point contact" transistor.

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Transistor Definition
 Transistor is an electronic device made of three layers
of semiconductor material that can act as an insulator
and a conductor.
 The three layered transistor is also known as the bipolar
junction transistor.
 The term bipolar refers to the use of both holes and
electrons as charge carriers in the transistor structure.
 There are two types of BJTs, the NPN and PNP.
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Types of Transistor

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Basic Construction

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Regions of the Transistor
• A transistor has three regions namely,
 Emitter- heavily doped
 Base- lightly doped
 Collector- moderately doped

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Regions of the Transistor cont’s
Bipolar Junction Transistors
NPN Transistor Most Common
Configuration
Base, Collector, and Emitter
Base is a very thin region with less
dopants
Base collector junction reversed
biased
Base emitter junction forward
biased
 PNP Transistor essentially the same
except for directionality
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Transistor operation
Force – voltage/current
water flow – current
 - amplification

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Transistor operation
Fluid flow analogy:
If fluid flows into the base, a much larger fluid can
flow from the collector to the emitter.
If a signal to be amplified is applied as a current to
the base, a valve between the collector and emitter
opens and closes in response to signal fluctuations.

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Transistor biasing

The base-emitter (BE) junction is

forward biased
The base-collector (BC) junction is
reverse biased.

IE=IB+IC

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Operating Regions

Cut off region

Linear region

Saturation region

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 BJT Mode

Cut-off Region: VBE < VFB, iB=0

 Transistor acts like an off switch
Active Linear Region: VBE=VFB,
iB≠0, iC=βiB
 Transistor acts like a current
amplifier
Saturation Region: VBE=VFB,
iB>iC,max/ β
 In this mode the transistor acts
like an on switch
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OPERATIONAL REGIONS OF A TRANSISTOR

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 Cut-off mode operation

In cut-off mode of operation, the

transistor stops conducting because
the voltage across its base-emitter
junction drops below 0.7 V, and its
collector base-junction becomes
reverse biased as shown in Fig.
 As a result, only leakage currents
exist in the transistor; IB and IC
essentially become 0 A.

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 Active mode operation

When the transistor operates in

active mode, its base-emitter
junction voltage, VBE, becomes
approximately equal to 0.7 V
although its collector-base junction
still remains reverse biased.
The base and collector currents
become proportional to each other
with a current gain of β (or hFE
according to some transistor
manufacturers) as shown in Fig. .
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 Saturation mode operation
When the transistor finally reaches
saturation region, its collector-base and
emitter-base junctions become forward
biased as shown in Fig. The transistor
remains in saturation as long as 𝑉𝐵𝐸 is
greater than 0.7 V. A typical 𝑉𝐵𝐸 and 𝑉𝐵𝐶
are approximately 0.8 and 0.6 V,
respectively.
 This produces 0.2 V between collector
and emitter terminals as shown in the
figure. In this mode, 𝐼𝐵 and 𝐼𝐶 can no
longer hold the linear relationship (𝐼𝐶 =
β𝐼𝐵28-Apr-21
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 Break????

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