CARRIER TRANSPORT

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 TRANSPORT
■ Net flow of electrons and holes in a semiconductor
generate currents, and the process by which these
charged particles move is called transport.
■ The carrier transport phenomena is the foundation for
determining the current-voltage characteristic of
semiconductor devices.
■ There are two basic transport mechanisms:
■ Drift: movement of charge due to electric fields
■ Diffusion: flow of charge due to density gradients (region
of high concentration toward a region of low
concentration)
■ In addition, the electrons and holes are in constant
motion due to thermal energy. However, the motion
due to the thermal energy is random and does not lead
to current flow.
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 Carrier Drift
■ Drift: the net movement of charge due to electric
fields.
■ Drift current: the net drift of charge gives rise to a
drift current.
■ This movement represent by drift velocity, vd.
■ Drift coefficient is called mobility, μ .
■ Mobility for electron and hole respectively μn & μp
■ Also, drift velocity for electron and hole
respectively vn & vp .
■ Those coefficients connect by electric field.

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Mobility
■ Mobility is an important parameter for carrier
transport because it describes how strongly the
motion of an electron or a holes is influenced by
an applied electric field.
■ How fast is the charge carrier can drift.
■ The higher the collision time, the greater is the
mobility. Also the lighter is the carrier, the greater
is its mobility.
■ Mobility depends strongly on Temperature and
Doping Concentration.

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Conductivity and
Resistivity
■ Conductivity is the measure of how easily
electricity flows.
■ So with an increase in temperature,
conductivity in semiconductor also
increases.
■ Electrical resistivity measures how much a
material resists the flow of electricity.

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q or e = electronic charge

For an intrinsic material, the conductivity

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If we consider, for example, a p-type semiconductor with an
acceptor doping NA (ND = 0) in which NA >> ni, and if we
assume that the electron and hole mobilities are of the
same order of magnitude, then the conductivity becomes

■ NA = concentration of acceptor atom

■ ND = concentration of donor atom
■ If we also assume complete ionization, then

■ The conductivity and resistivity of an extrinsic

semiconductor are a function primarily of the majority
carrier parameters 7
EXAMPLE 1

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EXAMPLE 2

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Diffusion ■ (a) Diffusion of
electrons due to a
density gradient.
■ (a) shows these
one-dimensional
flux and current
directions.
■ (b) Diffusion of
holes due to a
density gradient.
■ (b) shows the
diffusion of holes,
produces a flux of
holes in the
negative x
direction.
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The electron diffusion current density for this one
dimensional case is:

■ The hole diffusion current density is proportional to

the hole density gradient and to the electronic charge:

■ where Dn , Dp is called the electron and hole diffusion

coefficient, has units of cm2/s, and is a positive
quantity.

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EXAMPLE 3

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Total Current Density
■ The total current density is the sum of these four
components:
■ electron drift and diffusion currents
■ hole drift and diffusion currents.

■ or

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 EXAMPLE 4
■ Calculate the drift current density in a semiconductor for
a given electric field.
■ Consider a gallium arsenide sample at T = 300 K with
doping concentrations of Na = 0 and Nd = 1016 cm-3.
Assume complete ionization and assume electron and
hole mobilities given in Table 5.1. Calculate the drift
current density if the applied electric field is E = 10V/cm.

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SOLUTION 4

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The Semiconductor in Equilibrium:
Generation and recombination
■ Charge carriers move between valence and conduction
bands under thermal influence.
■ Generation is the process that acquiring energy to generation
electron which moves from valence band to conduction band
leaving free hole in the valance band; formation of electron-
hole pair
■ Recombination is the process that electron recombining with
hole looses energy and moves from conduction band to
valence band.

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Excess Carrier Generation and
Recombination
■ Electrons in the valence band may be excited into the
conduction band when, for example, high-energy photons
are incident on a semiconductor.
■ When this happens, not only is an electron created in the
conduction band, but a hole is created in the valence
band.
■ Thus, an electron–hole pair is generated.
■ The additional electrons and holes created are called
excess electrons and excess holes.
■ Excess electrons and holes do not move independently of
each other, but move together.
■ This common movement is called ambipolar transport.
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■ The excess electrons and holes are generated by an
external force at a particular rate.
■ When excess electrons and holes are created, the
concentration of electrons in the conduction band
and of holes in the valence band increase above
their thermal equilibrium value.
■ So that the semiconductor is no longer in thermal
equilibrium.

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■ A steady-state generation of excess electrons and
holes will not cause a continual buildup of the carrier
concentrations.
■ As in the case of thermal equilibrium, an electron in
the conduction band may “fall down” into the valence
band, leading to the process of excess electron–hole
recombination.

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EXAMPLE 5
■ Determine the diffusion coefficient given the carrier
mobility.
■ Assume that the mobility of a particular carrier is
1000 cm2/V-s at T = 300 K.
■ SOLUTION

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Continuity Equations

■ The continuity equation describes the behavior of excess

carriers with time and in space in the presence of electric
fields and density gradients.
■ The net increase in hole concentration per unit time,

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Recall: In one dimension, the electron and hole current
densities due to the drift and diffusion are given by:

■ Substitute these in the continuity equations:

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 Thermionic emission
■ When metals are heated, the conduction electrons
within them gain energy.
■ If these electrons gain sufficient energy, they are able
to leave the surface of the metal.
■ This is known as thermionic emission.

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 Tunneling
■ Tunneling is a quantum mechanical phenomenon when a
particle is able to penetrate through a potential energy barrier
that is higher in energy than the particle’s kinetic energy.
■ If the ball has enough energy (E) to overcome the potential
energy (V) at the top of the barrier between each valley, then
it can roll from one valley to the other.
■ However, if the ball does not have enough kinetic energy
(E<V), to overcome the barrier it will never roll from one
valley to the other.

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■ In contrast, when quantum effects are taken into
effect, the ball can "tunnel" through the barrier to
the other valley, even if its kinetic energy is less
than the potential energy of the barrier to the top
of one of the hills.
■ The mechanism by which the particle
“penetrates” the barrier is called tunneling.

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 Tunneling process
■ The wavefunction amplitude for
the particle is reduced by the
barrier, so that by making the
thickness W greater, we can
reduce Ψ on the right-hand side
to the point that negligible
tunneling occurs.
■ Tunneling is important only over
very small dimensions, but it
can be of great importance in
the conduction of electrons in
solids.
Quantum mechanical tunneling: (a) potential barrier of height V0
and thickness W; (b) probability density for an electron with
energy E < V0, indicating a nonzero value of the wave function
beyond the barrier.
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 High-Field Effects
■ One assumption implied was that Ohm’s law is valid in the carrier
drift processes.
■ That is, it was assumed that the drift current is proportional to the
electric field and that the proportionality constant σ is not a
function of field, ξ.
■ This assumption is valid over a wide range of ξ.
■ However, large electric fields (> 103 V/cm) can cause the drift
velocity and therefore the current to exhibit a sublinear
dependence on the electric field.
■ This dependence of σ upon is an example of a hot carrier effect,
which implies that the carrier drift velocity is comparable to the
thermal velocity vth.

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■ Drift velocity is then proportional to applied field.
■ As the field increases, drift velocity increases sublinearly
and appears to approach a limiting speed.

Saturation of
electron drift
velocity at high
electric fields
for Si.

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