Junction Breakdown

By

Sunil Kumar Tumma

Assistant Professor
KITS, Warangal.

8/24/21
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What is Junction Breakdown ?

In the ideal PN junction device, when a reverse bias
voltage is applied, a small reverse bias current flow
through the device. This reverse current remains very
small until a critical voltage is reached, at which point
the current suddenly increases. This sudden increase in
current is referred to as the junction breakdown

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Junction Diode Symbol and Static I-V Characteristics

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General Breakdown Characteristics

 The maximum reverse bias voltage that can be applied to
a p-n diode is limited by breakdown
 Breakdown is characterized by the rapid increase of the
current under reverse bias
 The corresponding applied voltage is referred to as the
breakdown voltage

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Types of Junction Breakdown

There are two physical mechanisms which give rise to

the reverse bias breakdown.

Zener Effect (Zener Breakdown)

Avalanche Effect (Avalanche Breakdown)

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Zener Effect (Zener Breakdown)

The Zener effect or Zener Breakdown is a type of
electrical breakdown in a reverse biased p-n diode in
which the electric field enables tunneling of electrons
from the valence to the conduction band of a
semiconductor, leading to a large number of free
minority carriers, which suddenly increase the reverse
current

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 Zener breakdown phenomena occurs in a pn junction diode with

heavy doping & thin junction

 Zener breakdown occurs when the electric field across the diode
junction increases

 This results in a force of attraction on the negatively charged

electrons at junction

 This force frees electrons from its covalent bond and moves
those free electrons to conduction band.

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When the electric field increases (with applied voltage), more

and more electrons are freed from its covalent bonds

This results in drifting of electrons across the junction and

electron hole recombination occurs

So a net current is developed and it increases rapidly with

increase in electric field

Electrons generated in this way are swept by the electric field

into the n side

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 Holes generated in this way are swept by the electric field into
the p side

 Zener breakdown occurs through tunneling mechanism

 Zener breakdown does not result in damage of diode

 Since current is only due to drifting of electrons, there is a limit

to the increase in current as well

 Temperature coefficient of the Zener mechanism is negative

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Tunneling Mechanism in p-n junction

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Zener Breakdown - Tunneling

Barrier must be thin:
depletion is narrow
doping on both sides
must be large

Must have empty states

to tunnel into 
Vbi + VBR > EG/q

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Avalanche Effect (Avalanche Breakdown)

The Avalanche breakdown process occurs when electrons
and/or holes, moving across the space charge region, acquire
sufficient energy from the electric field to create the electron-
hole pairs by colliding with atomic electrons within the
depletion region

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Reverse bias 1. Thick depletion region causes high

electric field and tremendous acceleration

2. Very few electrons make it through

depletion region with high velocity

3. These electrons collide with atoms in the

depletion region and free more electrons
( Process called Multiplication).

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 Avalanche Breakdown occurs in lightly doped pn-junctions

(Multiplication effect) where the depletion region is
comparatively long.
 The Doping density controls the breakdown voltage
 Avalanche breakdown occurs when the applied reverse
voltage is so large that electrons that are pulled from their
covalent bonds are accelerated to great velocities

The accelerated electrons collide with the silicon atoms and

knock off more electrons
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 The collisions in high velocity will generate further free

electrons and electron-hole pair recombination occurs
across the junction which increases the net current rapidly

The voltage at which the net current is maximum or we can

say breakdown occurs is called the breakdown voltage

Temperature coefficient of the Avalanche mechanism is

positive

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Avalanche effect can be illustrated from the figure below

 This figure is showing that

electrons are colliding with
the lattice resulting in
generation of free electrons
and further electrons are
accelerating and colliding
and generating more free
electrons

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Another Graphical Representation that how

electrons are multiplying

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 The multiplication in terms of other parameters can only be

found from experiment and is

where n is between 4 to 6 in Si and between 2 to 6 in Ge.

V= Reverse Voltage
Vo= Breakdown Voltage

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Recalling the VI characteristics of

pn-junction

 It is illustrated that Avalanche voltage

is greater than the Zener voltage

 Why the avalanche voltage is greater

than Zener voltage?

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Why the avalanche voltage is greater than
Zener voltage?
 Avalanche phenomena occurs in a diode which is moderately doped
and junction width (say d) which is high

 Zener break down occurs in a diode with heavy doping and thin
junction (here d is small)

 The electric field that occur due to applied reverse voltage (say V) can
be calculated as
E=

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 As the depletion layer in Zener breakdown is thin

 So in a Zener breakdown, the electric field necessary to

break electrons from covalent bond is achieved with lesser
voltage

 And the depletion layer in Avalanche breakdown is thick or

long

 So in a Avalanche breakdown, the electric field necessary to

break electrons from covalent bond is achieved with higher
voltage
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Temperature Dependence of Avalanche Breakdown Voltage

 Temperature coefficient of the

Avalanche mechanism is positive

 From the graph, breakdown

voltage is increasing as the
temperature is increasing

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Difference between Zener and Avalanche Breakdown

Zener Breakdown Avalanche Breakdown

 VI characteristics in the
breakdown region is soft
 Breakdown voltage decreases
with temperature
 No instability is observed in
Zener breakdown
 VI characteristics in the
breakdown region is hard
 Breakdown voltage decreases
with temperature
 Avalanche breakdown is always
accompanied by instability in
the current at the onset of
breakdown

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Applications of Breakdown Diodes (Zener and Avalanche)

 Breakdown diodes are used as voltage regulators in Power Supply

Circuits

 Breakdown diode can also be used as sources of a reference voltage

 Zener diode can be used as waveform clipper, as a voltage shifter

etc.

 Let us take an example of Zener diode as clipper circuit in next slide

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References:
 Semiconductor Physics and Devices, Donald Neamen, Tata McGraw Hill
 Introduction to Semiconductor Materials and Devices, M S Tyagi, Wiley India
 Physics of Semiconductor Devices, S M Sze
 http://www.circuitstoday.com/
 http://www.science-campus.com/engineering/electronics/semiconductor_theory

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