K.

RAMAKRISHNAN COLLEGE OF
TECHNOLOGY
DEPARTMENT OF ECE

20EC3103

ELECTRON DEVICES
 Introduction
• Electronic devices are components for controlling the flow of electrical
currents for the purpose of information processing and system control.
• Electronic devices are playing a major role in everyday life.
 UNIT 4
THEORY OF FET

JFETs — Drain and Transfer characteristics,-

Current equations-Pinch off voltage and its
significance-MOSFET- Characteristics
Threshold voltage -Channel length
modulation, D-MOSFET, E-MOSFET-
Characteristics - Comparison of MOSFET with
JFET.
 INTRODUCTION
• A Field Effect Transistor (FET) is a three-terminal semiconductor device. Drain(D),
Source(S), Gate (G)
• Used as an amplifier or switch
• Its operation is based on a controlled input voltage. By appearance JFET and bipolar
transistors are very similar.
• However, BJT is a current controlled device and JFET is controlled by input voltage. So
called as Voltage Controlled Device. Most commonly two types of FETs are available.
• Junction Field Effect Transistor (JFET)
• Metal Oxide Semiconductor FET (IGFET)

• FET current is carried by only one type of charge particles, either electrons or
holes. Hence called as Unipolar device(UJT).
FET is simple to fabricate and occupies less
space on a chip than a BJT. About 100000
FETs can be fabricated in a single chip. This
makes them useful in VLSI (very large scale
integrate) system.
 CONSTRUCTION OF N-CHANNEL JFET

Heavily doped electrodes of p-type material form p-n junctions on each side of the bar. The
thin region between the two p gates is called the channel. Since this channel is in the n type
bar, the FET in known as n-channel JFET.
 The electrons enter the channel through the terminal called SOURCE and leave
through the terminal called DRAIN. The terminals taken out from heavily doped
electrodes of p type material are called GATES.
 Usually these electrodes are connected together and only one terminal is taken out,
which is called Gate.
 CONSTRUCTION OF P-CHANNEL JFET

The principle of working n-channel JFET and p-channel JFET is similar; the only
difference being that in n-channel JFET the current is carried by electrodes while in p-
channel JFET, it is carried by holes.
 OPERATION OF N-CHANNEL JFET

 In JFET, the p-n junction between gate and source is always kept in reverse biased
conditions.
 Since the current in a reverse biased p-n junction is extremely small, practically
zero.
 The gate current in JFET is often neglected and assumed to be zero

 Let us consider the circuit in the figure, voltage VDD is applied between drain and source.
 Gate terminal is kept open. The bar is of n-type material.
 Due to the polarities of applied voltage as shown in the fig, the majority carriers i.e. the
electrons start flowing from the source to the drain.
 The flow of electrons makes the drain current, ID.
 The majority carriers move from source to drain through the space between the gate
regions.
 The space is commonly known as channel.
 The width of this channel can be controlled by varying the gate voltage. To see the
effect of gate voltage on channel width and on drain current ID
 The Gate and channel constitute a PN junction diode which is reverse biased by the gate to the source
voltage.
 A depletion layer is developed in the channel as reverse bias increases the width of depletion layer
increases.
 For a fixed drain to source voltage, the drain current will be a function of reverse bias voltage across
the gate junction.
 At a gate-to-source voltage VGS=Vp known as the “Pinch- off” voltage which eliminates the
channel, the channel width is reduces to zero.
 The term Field Effect is used to describe this device because of mechanism to control current using
reverse bias voltage VGS
 OPERATION OF P-CHANNEL JFET

To turn on a P-channel JFET, apply a positive voltage VS to

the source terminal of the transistor with no voltage applied to
the gate terminal of the transistor. This will allow a current to
flow through the drain-source channel. If the gate voltage, VG,
is 0V, the drain current is at its largest value for safe operation,
and the JFET is in the ON active region.

When a positive voltage is applied to the gate, the source-drain current is reduced. As the gate voltage,
VG, becomes more positive, the current lessens and lessens until it completes reaches cutoff, which is
when then JFET is in the Off condition and no current conducts across from source to drain. This stops
all drain-source current flow.
 Characteristics of JFET
The characteristics of JFET is defined by a plotting a curve between the drain current and
drain-source voltage.
the characteristics are of two types: output characteristics or drain characteristics, and the
another is transfer characteristics.
In the first case the output characteristics are observed when there is no bias, i.e. there is
no voltage applied between gate and source terminals.
Another condition is that the biasing is applied between gate and source terminals. In
both the condition the variation of drain current is different.
Output Characteristics or Drain Characteristics
1. In the absence of external bias: 
 There is no voltage between gate and source terminal, thus, the drain current will
flow from drain terminal to source terminal.
 The working of JFET that majority charge carriers flow from source to drain and as a
consequence of which the current flows from drain to source.
Terminologies

1. Knee Point
2. Channel Ohmic Region
3. Pinch-off point
4. Pinch-off Voltage
5. Drain-Source Saturation Current
With external bias
Transfer Characteristics

The drain-source voltage should be constant. The transfer characteristics are just

opposite to drain characteristics.
 Pinch off voltage and its significance
“Pinch-off” is not locked.
During pinch-off operation, the discharge current does not drop to zero. Instead, the Id current
becomes constant, remaining relatively independent of the Vds voltage.
The “pinch-off” mode in FET transistors is similar to the linear operating region of the BJT
transistors.
Pinch off voltage: Pinch off voltage is the drain to source voltage after which the drain to
source current becomes almost constant and JFET enters into saturation region and is defined
only when gate to source voltage is zero.
Transconductance

Transconductance is the ratio of change in drain current (ΔI D) to change in the

gate to source voltage (ΔVGS) at a constant drain to source voltage (VDS =
Constant).
Input resistance and Capacitance

Input resistance at the gate high Advantage

 Drain to Source Resistance

This is the ratio of change of drain to source

voltage (ΔVDS) to the change of drain current
(ΔID) at a constant gate to source voltage (VGS =
Constant). The ratio is denoted as rd.
Reciprocal of drain
characteristics

Amplification Factor

Power Dissipation
 CURRENT EQUATIONS

The relationship between the drain current and gate to source voltage is non-linear. This
relationship is defined by Shockley’s equation

Non-linear relationship between

 MOSFET
metal-oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor
- Used to design high density VLSI circuits
- No pn junction structure
- Input resistance is very high
D-MOSFET
- Insulated Gate (IGFETs)
E-MOSFET

-It is used as a switch and amplifier of signals in electronic circuits.

-It is widely used as discrete component and in integrated circuits.
-MOSFET is unipolar transistor
-uses only one type of charge carriers
-very little current to turn on and delivering much higher current load.
-main type of MOSFET n-channel and p-channel
 Depletion MOSFET (D-MOSFET)

Depletion MOSFET (D-MOSFET)- n-channel

It consists of a highly doped P-type substrate into

which two blocks of heavily doped N-type material
are diffused forming the source and drain.
The D-MOSFET can be operated in both depletion
mode and the enhancement mode. For this reason it is
also called depletion/enhancement MOSFET.
Enhancement-type MOSFET or E-MOSFET: The
E-MOSFET can be operated only in enhancement
mode.

The n-channel D-MOSFET is a piece of n-type material with a p-type region called
substrate on the right and an insulated gate on the left.
The free electrons flowing from source to drain must pass through the narrow channel
between the gate and the p-type region (i.e. substrate).
A thin layer of metal oxide, usually silicon dioxide (SiO2)
is deposited over a small portion of the channel. A metallic
gate is deposited over the oxide layer.
Since the gate is insulated from the channel, we can apply
either negative or positive voltage to the gate. Therefore, D-
MOSFET can be operated in both depletion-mode and
enhancement-mode.

Electrons flowing from source (when drain is positive w.r.t. source) must pass through this
narrow channel.
If we apply –ve gate voltage , the negative charges on the gate repel conduction electrons
from the channel, and attract holes from the p-type substrate.
The level of recombination between electrons and holes depends on the magnitude of the
negative voltage applied at the gate.
The greater the negative voltage applied at the gate, the greater the depletion n-channel
electrons.
Depletion MOSFET (D-MOSFET)- P-channel

The construction of the p-channel depletion type

MOSFET is exactly opposite of that n-channel
depletion type MOSFET.
Substrate-n type
Voltage polarities and current directions are
reversed
Drain current opposite polarities.
 Enhancement MOSFET (E-MOSFET)

Enhancement MOSFET (E-MOSFET)-n-channel

Depletion MOSFET (D-MOSFET)- n-channel