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1. Pre-work
a) The carrier concentrations for copper and pure (un-doped) and doped germanium are
approximately:
Copper:
Pure Germanium:
Doped Germanium: (Camacho-Aguilera et-al., 2012).
b) To increase the density of charge carriers in semiconductors, they are doped with impurities
(dopant atoms) from group III (an acceptor – three valence electrons) or group V (a donor – five
valence electrons) elements. Since a semiconductor has four valence electrons, a dopant either
introduces a positive or a negative charge carrier into the semiconductor.
A positive charge carrier, or p-type semiconductor is often doped with phosphorus.
A negative charge carrier, or n-type semiconductor is often doped with boron.
c) We know that:
Where:
n=
I = 50A
e=
=
T
Thus, we can rearrange the above equation to give:
Substituting in the above values gives a magnetic field density of B
d) Since by rearranging the above equation, we get:
This means the Hall Voltage is inversely proportional to the number of charge carriers. Thus, good
conductors with many charge carriers will have a lower Hall Voltage than a poor conductor with fewer
charge conductors, assuming comparable currents, magnetic fields, and dimensions. Thus, you don’t
need as many carriers to produce the same voltage.
2. Introduction
The Hall effect is a phenomenon of charge carriers of a current creating a voltage perpendicular to its
flow in the presence of a magnetic field. While commonly used as sensor for electromechanical
purposes, it can also be used to determine the charge carrier density of a doped semiconductor using
equation (1). In addition, by using noting the polarity of the Hall Voltage, the type of charge carrier can
also be determined.
This experiment aims to use the linear relationship between the current and Hall voltage to determine
the charge carrier density of the sample semiconductor, as well as its dopant. In finding and
comparing this measured value to the accepted value, a better understanding of the structure of
intrinsic and doped semiconductors shall be attained.
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3. Methods and Materials
Table 3.1 – Equipment and Components List
Equipment Components (Quantity and
Type)
Germanium Hall Effect Wafer Module 1
Variable Power Supply 1 x 32v Gw Instek GPS-303
Digital Multimeter 2 x Lutron DM-9090
Magnets 2
Variable Resistance Board 1
Banana Plugs 6
Gauss Meter 1
1. Connected the equipment as shown in figure 1.
2. Set the variable resistance board to .
3. Set the power supply to voltage control, adjusted the voltage until the ammeter reads 5.00mA.
4. Adjusted the potentiometer on the Hall Effect module until the voltmeter (Hall Voltage) read
0V. Ensured this voltage remained at 0 as the power supply voltage (and current) was varied.
5. Carefully placed one of each magnet on opposite sides of the wafer.
6. Beginning from 1.00mA, took voltage readings at fixed current values up to 25.00mA.
7. Using the Gauss meter, measured the flux density of the magnets.
Figure 1 - Experiment setup
4. Measurements and Results
The table below shows the measured changes in the Hall voltage of the germanium wafer with
current:
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Table 4.2 – Experimental temperature and voltage measurements
Current Hall Voltage
(mA) (mV)
1 4.4
2 8.5
3 13
4 17.4
5 21.8
6 26.2
7 30.3
8 34.7
9 38.9
10 43.4
11 47.9
12 51.9
13 56.2
14 60.6
15 65.1
16 69.3
17 73.8
18 78.1
19 82.5
20 86.9
21 91.2
22 95.6
23 99.9
24 104.1
25 108.6
Using the above table to graph the voltage vs current, the following graph is obtained:
Hall Voltage changes with Current
120
100 f(x) = 4.34 x − 0.04
R² = 1
80
Voltage (mV)
60
40
20
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Current (mA)
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5. Analysis and Discussion
Rearranging equation (2) into a linear equation in the form y = mx, we get:
The board used for the experiments was board 1, however the magnetic flux density of the magnets
was not displayed. The measured flux density of the magnets was 0.336T.
To determine what the gradient of the plotted line is, the Excel function LINEST was used to calculate
the least squares regression line, giving the following equation:
Since no voltage should be present with no current, the intercept is considered an error and ignored.
By equating the gradient and equation (3), it can be seen that:
By then rearranging to make n the subject and knowing that the thickness of the wafer is 1mm, it was
calculated that the charge carrier density is approximately , approximately a 20.7% error from the
agreed value found in the pre-work.
In addition, other errors such as lack of comprehensive significant figures in measurement devices, as
well as the thermal relationship between the temperature and the bandgap of a semiconductor would
have also influence the uncertainty of the measured values. While difficult to quantify these sources of
uncertainty without calibration, all factors considered can propagate errors to attain the uncertainty
value as found above. Every germanium wafer would also not be uniform, thus would also result in
different charge carrier densities for different wafers.
In order to reduce these uncertainties, high precision equipment as well as consistency throughout all
measurements would help reduce, but not necessarily eliminate these uncertainties.
Using the right-hand rule to determine the movement of a positive charge carrier in a magnetic field,
as seen in figure 2, if the charge carriers were positive, moving from top to bottom in figure 1, they
would be affected by a force to the left, thus creating a negative voltage on the voltmeter. Since the
voltmeter produced a positive voltage, it was concluded that in fact negative charges are the majority
carrier, and thus the germanium is n-doped.
Figure 2 - Force due to a magnetic field on charge carriers
6. Conclusion
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In experimenting to find the carrier density and type of a doped germanium wafer, it was better
understood the mechanisms of a semiconductor and the physics underlying its operation. It was found
that a magnetic field in the presence of a current, creating a voltage perpendicular to that direction,
meant the presence of charges within a material not intrinsically conductive. In knowing the bandgap
principles of semiconductor materials from Lab 1, as well as the doping undertaken and Hall effect
from this lab, it was better understood how important quantum physics is to explain the mechanism by
which these results are found, which cannot be explained by classical physics.
