BIPOLAR JUNCTION TRANSISTORS (BJT)

Robert L.Boylestad

BIPOLAR JUNCTION TRANSISTOR



A transistor consists of two pn junctions formed by sandwiching either p-type or ntype semiconductor between a pair of opposite types. There are two types of transistors: n-p-n Transistor: An n-p-n transistor is composed of two n-type semiconductors separated by a thin section of p-type as shown in the fig..

Fig: n-p-n Transistor

BIPOLAR JUNCTION TRANSISTOR



p-n-p Transistor. A p-n-p transistor is formed by two p-sections separated by a thin section of ntype as shown in fig

NOTE POINTS FOR TRANSISTOR



These are two pn junctions and may be regarded as a combinations of two diodes connected back to back. There are three terminals taken from each type of semiconductor

NOTE POINTS FOR TRANSISTOR



The middle section is a very thin layer. This is the most important function of a transistor. A transistor has two pn junction, one is forward biased and another is reverse biased The forward biased junction has a low resistance path and a reverse biased junction has a high resistance path.

ORIGIN OF THE NAME TRANSISTOR



The weak signal is introduced in the low resistance circuit ant output is taken from the high resistance circuit. Therefore a transistor transfer a signal from a low resistance to high resistance. The prefix trans means the signal transfer property of the device while istor classifies it as a solid element in the same family with resistors.

NAMING THE TRANSISTOR TERMINAL

 Emitter. The section on one side that supplies charge carriers is called emitter. The emitter is always forward biased with respect to base so that it can supply a large number of majority carriers.  Collector. The section on the other side that collects charges is called the collector. The collector is always reverse biased. Its function is to remove charges from its junction with the base.  Base. The middle section which forms two pn-junction between the emitter and collector is called the base. The base emitter junctions forward biased, allowing low resistance for the emitter circuit. The base collector junction is reverse biased and provides high resistance in the collector circuit

Fig: TRANSISTOR TERMINAL

SOME FACTS ON TRANSISTORS

 The base is much thinner than the emitter and collector both.  The emitter is heavily doped, the base is lightly doped and the collector is moderately doped.  The transistor is just like two diodes i.e. the emitter-base diode, simply the emitter-diode and the collector-base diode or collector-diode.  The emitter diode is always forward biased and the collector diode is always reverse biased.  The resistance of the emitter diode is very small compared to collector diode.

TRANSISTOR SYMBOL
 For the sake of convenience, the transistors are represented by the schematic diagrams.  For npn connection, the conventional current flews out of the emitter as indicated by the outgoing arrow.  For pnp connection, the conventional current flows into the emitter as indicated by inward arrow

Fig: TRANSISTOR SYMBOL

TRANSITOR OPERATION
 The basic operation of pnp and npn transistor is the same if the role played by the electron and holes are interchanged.  pnp transistor is redrawn without the base to collector bias  Remove the base to emitter bias and reverse bias the np junction- Explain  Now both the biasing is applied

PNP FORWARD-BIASED JUNCTION:

 Now let us consider what happens when the emitter-base junction is forward biased.  With the bias setup shown, the positive terminal of the battery repels the emitter holes toward the base, while the negative terminal drives the base electrons toward the emitter.

PNP FORWARD-BIASED JUNCTION:

 When an emitter hole and a base electron meet, they combine. For each electron that combines with a hole, another electron leaves the negative terminal of the battery, and enters the base. At the same time, an electron leaves the emitter, creating a new hole, and enters the positive terminal of the battery. This movement of electrons into the base and out of the emitter constitutes base current flow (IB), and the path these electrons take is referred to as the emitterbase circuit.

PNP REVERSE-BIASED JUNCTION:

 In the reverse-biased junction the negative voltage on the collector and the positive voltage on the base block the majority current carriers from crossing the junction.  However, this same negative collector voltage acts as forward bias for the minority current holes in the base, which cross the junction and enter the collector.

PNP REVERSE-BIASED JUNCTION:

 The minority current electrons in the collector also sense forward bias-the positive base voltage-and move into the base.  The holes in the collector are filled by electrons that flow from the negative terminal of the battery. At the same time the electrons leave the negative terminal of the battery, other electrons in the base break their covalent bonds and enter the positive terminal of the battery. Although there is only minority current flow in the reversebiased junction, it is still very small because of the limited number of minority current carriers.

Fig: A properly biased PNP transistor.

TRANSISTOR CONNECTIONS

TRANSISTOR CONNECTIONS
 Common base connection  Common emitter connection  Common collector connection  Regardless of the circuit connection, the emitter is always biased in the forward direction and the collector is always has a reverse bias

COMMON BASE CONFIGURATION

The common base terminology is derived from the fact that the base is common to both the input and output sides of the configuration.   The arrow in the graphic symbol defines the direction of emitter current (conventional flow) through the device.  All the current direction are the actual directions as defined by the choice of conventional flow

Fig: Common base configuration

TWO SETS OF CHARACTERISTICS

 Input or driving point characteristic The input sets for the common base amplifier will relate an input current IE to an input voltage VBE for various levels of output voltage VCB.  Output set will relate an output current IC to an output voltage VCB for various levels of input current IE  The Output or the Collector Characteristics The output or the collector set of characteristics has three basic regions of interest: a. The active region
b. c. The cutoff region The saturation region

Characteristics of Common-Base Connection

 Input Characteristic a. The emitter current IE increases rapidly with small increase in emitter base voltage VEB. This means the emitter base resistance is very small. a. The emitter current is almost independent of collector base voltage VCB i.e. emitter current is almost independent of collector voltage.

Characteristics of Common-Base Connection

 Output Characteristic a. The collector current varies with VCB only at very low voltage but the transistor never operate in this region. b. When VCB is raised the collector current is constant indicated by straight horizontal line means IC is independent of VCB. Very large change in VCB causes very small change in IC ,means the output resistance is high.

c.

Fig: Common-Base Connection

 In the active region base-emitter junction is forward biased and the collector base junction is reverse biased  The active region is defined by the biasing arrangement. At the lower end of the active region the emitter current IE is zero and the collector current is just the reverse saturation current ICBO (a small current).  At higher temperature the current ICBO may become an important factor, since it increase rapidly with temperature.  As the emitter current increases above zero, the collector current increases to a magnitude essentially equal to that of the emitter current as determined by the basic transistor current relations.  The first approximation to the relationship between IE and IC in the active region is I E $ I C

 In the cutoff region the base-emitter and collectorbase junctions of a transistor are both reversebiased.  The saturation region is defined as that region of the characteristics to the left of VCB  In the saturation region the base-emitter and collector-base junctions are forward-biased.  The input characteristics reveal that for fixed values of collector voltage VCB ,as the base emitter voltage increase, the emitter current increase in a manner that closely resembles the diode characteristics.

ALPHA ( )
 In the dc mode the levels of IC and IE due to the majority carriers are related by a quantity called alpha and defined by the equation. dc=IC/IE. Where IC and IE are the levels of current at the point of operation.  The characteristics suggests =1 but in practical level extends from 0.90 to 0.998  Since alpha is defined solely for the majority carrier the I C ! E I E  I CBO equation becomes:  For ac situation where the point of operation moves on the characteristic curve, an ac alpha is defined by
E ac ( IC ! (IE

V C B ! C o n s ta n

 The ac alpha is formally called the common base, shortcircuit, amplification factor. For most situations the magnitudes of ac and dc are quite same, permitting the use of the magnitude of one for the other

TRANSISTOR AMPLIFYING ACTION (khata)

 The basic amplifying action of the transistor can be explained by the network shown on board. The dc biasing is not shown, our interest is on ac response.  For common base configuration the ac input resistance from the input characteristics curve Is quite small and varies from 10 to 100 ohms.  The output resistance is determined by the output characteristics curve Is quite high and typically varies from 50 kilo-ohms to 1 mega-ohms.  The difference of resistance is due to the forward biased junction at the input and reverse-biased junction at the output

TRANSISTOR AMPLIFYING ACTION

 Using a common value of 20 ohm for the input resistance we find. Ii= Vi/R i=200mv/20 ohm=10mA Let dc=1 IL= Ii =10mA VL= I Lx R=10mA x 5 Kilo ohm = 50 V Av= VL/ Vi =50 V/200mv = 250

TRANSISTOR AMPLIFYING ACTION

 The voltage and current amplification is defined as VL I L IC
AV ! Vi and Ai ! Ii ! IE

 Typical value of voltage amplification for common base configuration is 50 to 300 and current amplification is always less than 1 since IC= IE where, is less than one.  The basic amplifying action was done by transferring a current from a low resistance circuit to high resistance circuit and the combination is

COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION
 The most commonly used configuration for both npn and pnp transistors.  The emitter is common to both input and output terminals.  Two sets of characteristics, input or baseemitter circuit and output or collector-emitter circuit.  The transistor configuration has been changed but the current direction stands:
I E ! I C  I B and I C ! E I E

Fig: COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION

COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION
 The output characteristics are a plot of the output current IC vs output voltage VCE for a range of values of input current IB  The input characteristics are a plot of the input current IB vs the input voltage VBE for a range of values or output voltage VCE  The magnitude of IB is in microamp not in miliamp as CB. IB is not horizontal as IE of the common base configuration, i.e. VCE will influence the collector current.  In the active region of a common-emitter amplifier, the base emitter junction is forward-biased and the collector-base junction is reverse biased.

Fig: COMMON-EMITTERCONFIGURATION

 Input characteristics: the EB junction of the common-emitter configuration can also be considered as a forward biased diode, the current-voltage characteristics is similar to that of a diode:

 The collector-emitter voltage, VCE has little effect on IB .

Fig: COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION

COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION
 Output characteristics : The CB junction is reverse biased, the current depends on the current, IB. When IB =0,IC=ICEO , the current caused by the minority carriers crossing the pn-junctions. When IB is increased, IC is correspondingly increased by fold.

COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION v.s COMMON-BQSE CONFIGURATION

The collector characteristics of the commonbase (CB) and common-emmitter (CE) configurations have the following differences:

 In CB circuit is slightly less than IE , while in CE circuit is much larger than IB .  In CB circuit IC >0, when VCB=0 ; while in CE circuit when VCE=0. This is because in CE circuit, when VCE=0, VCB=VBE has the effect of suppressing IE .

COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION v.s COMMON-BQSE CONFIGURATION

 Increased VCE will slightly increase but more greatly increase , thereby causing more significantly increased IC .  IC is determined by two variables VCE and IB . When VCE is small ( ), its slight increase will cause significant increase of IC. But when VCE>0.3 V , its further increase will not cause much change in IC due to saturation (all available charge carriers arrive at collector C), and is mostly determined by IB .

COMMON-EMITTER CONFIGURATION
 The active region of the common emitter configuration can be employed for voltage, current or power amplification  The cutoff region is not well defined as common I C ! E I E  I CBO base configuration
I C ! E ( I C  I B )  I CBO

 Explain with the help of equations

E I B I CBO IC !  1E 1E

 For linear amplification purpose, cutoff for the common emitter will be defined by ICBO
IC ! ICEO ! 1E
I B !0

 Transistor operates in the cutoff and saturation region when used as a switch

BETA ( )
 In the dc mode the levels of IC and IB are related by a quantity called beta and defined by the following equation. The range of beta is normally 50 to 400
F
dc

IC ! IB

 For ac situation ac beta has been defined as

F dc (IC ! (I B
V E ! C ons tan t

 The formal name of ac is common emitter, forward current, amplification factor. Since the collector current is the output current and base current is the input current, the term amplification is included.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN

IC I ! IC  C E F Dividing both sides by IC IE ! I C  IB F E 1 1 ! 1 E ! F ! E F F 1 1E

AND

IC IC F ! IB ! IB F

E!

IC I IE ! C IE E

I CBO 1 I CEO ! and ! F 1 1E 1E I CEO ! ( F  1) I CBO $ F I CBO

 Beta is an important parameter, it has direct link between input and output current for a common emitter configuration i.e. IC !FIB IE ! IB IC !FIB IB !(F 1)IB