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Transistor: How Does It Work - NPN & PNP

The document discusses the basics of how bipolar junction transistors (BJTs) work, including their structure and operation. It explains that a BJT has three terminals - the emitter, base, and collector - and consists of either an NPN or PNP arrangement of semiconductor layers. The base acts as a gate to control the flow of majority charge carriers between the emitter and collector. When a small current is applied to the base of an NPN transistor, it allows a much larger current to flow from the emitter to the collector. BJTs are commonly used in electronics and were a major enabling technology before the development of integrated circuits.

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111 views

Transistor: How Does It Work - NPN & PNP

The document discusses the basics of how bipolar junction transistors (BJTs) work, including their structure and operation. It explains that a BJT has three terminals - the emitter, base, and collector - and consists of either an NPN or PNP arrangement of semiconductor layers. The base acts as a gate to control the flow of majority charge carriers between the emitter and collector. When a small current is applied to the base of an NPN transistor, it allows a much larger current to flow from the emitter to the collector. BJTs are commonly used in electronics and were a major enabling technology before the development of integrated circuits.

Uploaded by

adeel
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Transistor: How Does It Work - NPN &

PNP
The development of the bipolar transistor or bipolar junction transistor, BJT, has resulted in many
changes to the world.

BJT Applications: transistor radios, through to mobile phones, and computers, remote operation, the
functionality we take for granted in current day automobiles, etc

Transistors are also widely used within integrated circuits. Most digital ICs use field effect
technology, but many analogue ICs use bipolar technology to provide the required performance.

Plastic leaded transistor selection

Transistor development
The first semiconductor effects were noticed back in the early 1900s when the first wireless or radio
sets were being used. Thermionic valve or vacuum tube technology was introduced in 1904, but
these devices were expensive, and also required powering by a battery..

Note on Transistor History:


The bipolar transistor was invented by three researchers working at Bell Labroratories: John
Bardeen, Walter Brattain, and William Schockley. They had been working on an idea that used a
field effect to control the current in a semiconductor, but they were unable to make the idea work.
They turned their focus onto another possibility and made a three terminal device using two closely
spaced point contacts on a wafer of germanium. This idea worked and they were able to
demonstrate it provided gain in late 1949.
Old OC71 bipolar transistor

After the basic idea was developed, it took some time before semiconductor technology was
adopted, but once it was, it took off in a major way as we know today.

Bipolar transistor:
A bipolar transistor is a semiconductor device consisting of three areas either P-type or N-type - an
area of one type is sandwiched between areas of the other. The transistor fundamentally amplifies
current but it can be connected in circuits designed to amplify voltage or power.

A bipolar transistor needs to be differentiated from a field effect transistor. A bipolar junction
transistor, BJT, gains its name from the fact that it uses both holes and electrons in its operation.
Field effect transistors are unipolar devices using one or either type of charge carrier.

A bipolar transistor, or more exactly a bipolar junction transistor, BJT, has two PN diode junctions
which are back to back. The bipolar transistor has three terminals, named the emitter, base and
collector.

The transistor amplifies current - bipolar transistors are current devices, unlike thermionic valves
vacuum tubes, and FETs which are voltage devices.

Basic transistor structure


The transistor is a three terminal device and consists of three distinct layers. Two of them are doped
to give one type of semiconductor and the there is the opposite type, i.e. two may be n-type and one
p-type, or two may be p-type and one may be n-type.. They are arranged so that the two similar
layers of the transistor sandwich the layer of the opposite type. As a result these semiconductor
devices are designated as either PNP transistors or NPN transistors according to the way they are
made up.
Circuit Diagram of NPN

The names for the three electrodes widely used but their meanings are not always understood:

 Base: The base is the gate controller device for the larger electrical supply.

 Emitter: The emitter gains its name from the fact that it emits the charge carriers.

 Collector: The collector gains its name from the fact that it collects the charge carriers.

For the operation of the transistor, it is essential that the base region is very thin. In today's
transistors the base may typically be only about 1µm across. It is the fact that the base region of
the transistor is thin that is the key to the operation of the device

Transistor working: the basics


A transistor can be considered as two P-N junctions placed back to back. One of these, namely the
base emitter junction is forward biased, whilst the other, the base collector junction is reverse
biased. It is found that when a current is made to flow in the base emitter junction a larger current
flows in the collector circuit even though the base collector junction is reverse biased.
For clarity the example of an NPN transistor is taken. The same reasoning can be used for a PNP
device, except that holes are the majority carriers instead of electrons.

Working:

When current flows through the base emitter junction, electrons leave the emitter and flow into the
base. However the doping in this region is kept low and there are comparatively few holes available
for recombination. As a result most of the electrons are able to flow right through the base region
and on into the collector region, attracted by the positive potential.

Only a small proportion of the electrons from the emitter combine with holes in the base region
giving rise to a current in the base-emitter circuit. This means that the collector current is much
higher.

The ratio between the collector current and the base current is given the Greek symbol Β. For most
small signal transistors this may be in the region 50 to 500. In some cases it can be even higher.
This means that the collector current is typically between 50 and 500 times that flowing in the base.
For a high power transistor the value of Β is somewhat less: 20 is a fairly typical value.

Why NPN transistors are used more than


PNP transistors
When looking at circuits and also in datasheets, etc, it will be seen that NPN transistors are far more
popular than PNP transistors.

There are several reasons for this:

 Carrier mobility: NPN transistors use electrons as the majority carriers rather than holes that
are the majority carriers in PNP transistors. As electrons move far more easily within the crystal
lattice than electrons, i.e. they have a higher mobility, they can operate faster and provide a much
better level of performance.
 Production costs: The manufacture of silicon based semiconductor components is most
economically undertaken using large N type silicon wafers. Whilst it is possible to manufacture
PNP transistors, requires 3 times more surface area of the wafer, and this significantly increases
the costs. As the wafer costs form a major part of the overall component cost, this increased
production costs significantly for PNP transistors.

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