Credits:
Semesters Offered
Learning Objectives
- Understand crystal properties, quantum mechanical aspects, and energy bands in semiconductor materials
- Understand transport of charged mobile carriers in semiconductors (excess carriers, drift-diffusion)
- Understand the formation of a p-n junction diode (built-in potential, electric field, charge transport). Understand the operation of the BJT
- Understand the formation of a metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) capacitor interface in terms of energy band, Fermi levels, and charge redistribution), and apply to a three terminal device such as the MOSFET and the operational characteristics of this device
- Understand the interaction of photons and semiconductors in terms of electron-hole pair generation and the results of such interaction in optoelectronic devices such as solar cells, photodetectors, light emitting and laser diodes
Topics Covered
- Crystal Properties of semiconductor materials
- Quantum Mechanical aspects of crystalline solids, quantum wells, tunneling
- The concept of energy bands in semiconductors (conduction and valence bands, Fermi-Dirac distribution function for electrons and holes, density of energy states, effective mass of electrons and holes in side a crystal potential distribution, mobility, transport, current)
- Charged mobile carriers in semiconductors (excess carriers, optical absorption, generation and recombination, steady-state, quasi Fermi levels, drift, diffusion-recombination and the continuity equation)
- P-N Junction Diodes (built-in potential, depletion region, internal-external electric fields, currents under forward and reverse bias. Capacitance and Current-voltage characteristics. Schottky diodes. Tunnel diodes, Zener diodes, avalanche breakdown, deviations from ideal transport, ideality factor, recombination-generation in the depletion region, high injection, series resistance)
- MOSFETs. MOS capacitor energy band, accumulation, depletion, inversion, flat band voltage, threshold voltage. MOSFET operation, currents, and transfer characteristics
- Bipolar Junction Transistors (BJTs). Principle of operation, transistor parameters, currents, Early effect (base width modulation), breakdown, base resistance, capacitances and high frequency operation
- Optoelectronic Devices. Solar cell principle of operation, photoconductor-photodetector operation and design. Principle of LED operation. Lasers: fundamental principles of light amplification in a solid state device. Resonant cavities, and diode design for population inversion
[3] Credit only granted for: ENEE312 or ENEE313.