Jude B.

Sario
ME 4
Topic 5: Bipolar Junction Transistor

A bipolar junction transistor (bipolar transistor or BJT) is a type of transistor that uses both
electron and hole charge carriers. In contrast, unipolar transistors, such as field-effect
transistors, only use one kind of charge carrier. For their operation, BJTs use two junctions
between two semiconductor types, n-type and p-type.

BJTs are manufactured in two types, NPN and PNP, and are available as individual
components, or fabricated in integrated circuits, often in large numbers. The basic function
of a BJT is to amplify current. This allows BJTs to be used as amplifiers or switches, giving
them wide applicability in electronic equipment, including computers, televisions, mobile
phones, audio amplifiers, industrial control, and radio transmitters.

By convention, the direction of current on diagrams is shown as the direction that a

positive charge would move. This is called conventional current. However, current in many
metal conductors is due to the flow of electrons which, because they carry a negative
charge, move in the opposite direction to conventional current. On the other hand, inside a
bipolar transistor, currents can be composed of both positively charged holes and
negatively charged electrons. In this article, current arrows are shown in the conventional
direction, but labels for the movement of holes and electrons show their actual direction
inside the transistor. The arrow on the symbol for bipolar transistors points in the
direction conventional current travels. BJTs come in two types, or polarities, known as PNP
and NPN based on the doping types of the three main terminal regions. An NPN transistor
comprises two semiconductor junctions that share a thin p-doped region, and a PNP
transistor comprises two semiconductor junctions that share a thin n-doped region.

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NPN BJT with forward-biased EB junction and reverse-biased BC junction

Charge flow in a BJT is due to diffusion of charge carriers across a junction between two
regions of different charge concentrations. The regions of a BJT are called emitter, collector,
and base.[note 1] A discrete transistor has three leads for connection to these regions.
Typically, the emitter region is heavily doped compared to the other two layers, whereas
the majority charge carrier concentrations in base and collector layers are about the same.
By design, most of the BJT collector current is due to the flow of charges injected from a
high-concentration emitter into the base where they are minority carriers that diffuse
toward the collector, and so BJTs are classified as minority-carrier devices.

In typical operation, the baseemitter junction is forward biased, which means that the p-
doped side of the junction is at a more positive potential than the n-doped side, and the
basecollector junction is reverse biased. In an NPN transistor, when positive bias is
applied to the baseemitter junction, the equilibrium is disturbed between the thermally
generated carriers and the repelling electric field of the n-doped emitter depletion region.
This allows thermally excited electrons to inject from the emitter into the base region.
These electrons diffuse through the base from the region of high concentration near the
emitter towards the region of low concentration near the collector. The electrons in the
base are called minority carriers because the base is doped p-type, which makes holes the
majority carrier in the base.

To minimize the percentage of carriers that recombine before reaching the collectorbase
junction, the transistor's base region must be thin enough that carriers can diffuse across it
in much less time than the semiconductor's minority carrier lifetime. In particular, the
thickness of the base must be much less than the diffusion length of the electrons. The
collectorbase junction is reverse-biased, and so little electron injection occurs from the
collector to the base, but electrons that diffuse through the base towards the collector are
swept into the collector by the electric field in the depletion region of the collectorbase
junction. The thin shared base and asymmetric collectoremitter doping are what
differentiates a bipolar transistor from two separate and oppositely biased diodes
connected in series.

Voltage, current, and charge control

The collectoremitter current can be viewed as being controlled by the baseemitter

current (current control), or by the baseemitter voltage (voltage control). These views are
related by the currentvoltage relation of the baseemitter junction, which is just the usual
exponential currentvoltage curve of a p-n junction (diode).[1]

The physical explanation for collector current is the concentration of minority carriers in
the base region.[1][2][3] Due to low level injection (in which there are much fewer excess
carriers than normal majority carriers) the ambipolar transport rates (in which the excess
majority and minority carriers flow at the same rate) is in effect determined by the excess
minority carriers.

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Detailed transistor models of transistor action, such as the GummelPoon model, account
for the distribution of this charge explicitly to explain transistor behaviour more exactly.[4]
The charge-control view easily handles phototransistors, where minority carriers in the
base region are created by the absorption of photons, and handles the dynamics of turn-off,
or recovery time, which depends on charge in the base region recombining. However,
because base charge is not a signal that is visible at the terminals, the current- and voltage-
control views are generally used in circuit design and analysis.

In analog circuit design, the current-control view is sometimes used because it is

approximately linear. That is, the collector current is approximately times the base
current. Some basic circuits can be designed by assuming that the emitterbase voltage is
approximately constant, and that collector current is beta times the base current. However,
to accurately and reliably design production BJT circuits, the voltage-control (for example,
EbersMoll) model is required.[1] The voltage-control model requires an exponential
function to be taken into account, but when it is linearized such that the transistor can be
modeled as a transconductance, as in the EbersMoll model, design for circuits such as
differential amplifiers again becomes a mostly linear problem, so the voltage-control view
is often preferred. For translinear circuits, in which the exponential IV curve is key to the
operation, the transistors are usually modeled as voltage-controlled current sources whose
transconductance is proportional to their collector current. In general, transistor-level
circuit design is performed using SPICE or a comparable analog circuit simulator, so model
complexity is usually not of much concern to the designer.

Turn-on, turn-off, and storage delay

The bipolar transistor exhibits a few delay characteristics when turning on and off. Most
transistors, and especially power transistors, exhibit long base-storage times that limit
maximum frequency of operation in switching applications. One method for reducing this
storage time is by using a Baker clamp.

Transistor parameters: alpha () and beta ()

The proportion of electrons able to cross the base and reach the collector is a measure of
the BJT efficiency. The heavy doping of the emitter region and light doping of the base
region causes many more electrons to be injected from the emitter into the base than holes
to be injected from the base into the emitter.

The common-emitter current gain is represented by F or the h-parameter hFE; it is

approximately the ratio of the DC collector current to the DC base current in forward-active
region. It is typically greater than 50 for small-signal transistors but can be smaller in
transistors designed for high-power applications.

Another important parameter is the common-base current gain, F. The common-base

current gain is approximately the gain of current from emitter to collector in the forward-

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active region. This ratio usually has a value close to unity; between 0.980 and 0.998. It is
less than unity due to recombination of charge carriers as they cross the base region.

Alpha and beta are more precisely related by the following identities (NPN transistor):

Bipolar Junction Transistor (BJT) is a Semiconductor device constructed with three doped
Semiconductor Regions (Base, Collector and Emitter) separated by two p-n Junctions,
Figure 1. The p-n Junction between the Base and the Emitter has a Barrier Voltage (V0) of
about 0.6 V, which is an important parameter of a BJT. Unlike the Field Effect Transistor
(FET), in which Current is produced only by one type of Charge Carrier (Electrons or
Holes), in BJT, Current is produced by both types of Charge Carriers (Electrons and Holes),
hence the name Bipolar.

There are two Types of BJT: npn and pnp. The npn Type consists of two n-Regions
separated by a p-Region. The pnp Type consists of two p-Regions separated by an n-Region.
Figures 2 and Figure 3 are their schematic symbols respectively. The following explanation
focuses on the npn BJT.

Figure 2: Schematic symbol of an npn, BJT

Figure 3: Schematic symbol of a pnp, BJT

The BJT operates in three different modes: Cutoff mode, Linear Amplification mode and
Saturation mode, Figure 4. Table 1 is a summary of the three Operation Modes of an npn
BJT.

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Figure 4: IC-VCE Characteristics Curves of an npn BJT

BJT is very important in electronics. They are used extensively in other Exhibits, especially
as Amplifiers in analog circuit and Electronic Switches in digital circuit.

Reference:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipolar_junction_transistor

http://macao.communications.museum/eng/exhibition/secondfloor/MoreInfo/2_10_3_Ho
wTransistorWorks.html

https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/textbook/semiconductors/chpt-4/bipolar-junction-
transistors-bjt/

http://fourier.eng.hmc.edu/e84/lectures/ch4/node3.html

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