EE386 Electronics II

Lasantha Rathnayake M.Eng. (Unimelb, AUS) , B.Sc.Eng. (Pera, SL)

Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering,
University of Peradeniya,
Sri Lanka
L1 : Semiconductors Recap
 The invention of the p–n junction is usually attributed to American physicist Russell
Ohl of Bell Laboratories in 1939.
 Bardeen and Brattain at Bell Laboratories in the US invented the point-contact
transistor in 1947, and Shockley invented the junction transistor in 1948.

Voltage rectifiers

Fast switching app.

Voltage regulators 2-input ______Gate

Field effect transistors

 Why do we need FET?
 Field effect transistors are classified into two types such as JFET and MOSFET.
 The major difference between BJT and FET is that, in a field effect transistor only majority
charge carries flows, whereas in BJT both majority and minority charge carriers flow.

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 Structure and Operation of a JFET

 Voltage controlled resistor?

 The drain-to-source voltage at which the saturation of drain current begins when Vgs = 0 is
refferd to as the ‘pinch-off-voltage’ Vpo

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Example 1: For the circuit given, determine the output voltage Vo and the transistor state for the
input voltage Vi of (1) -5V (b) 0V. The output characteristics of the JFET are given next to that.

Example2: For the JFET in figure, VGS(off)= -4V and IDSS = 12mA. Determine the minimum value of
VDD required to put the device in the constant-current area of operation.

JFET Transfer characteristic curve

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Example3: Determine the drain current for VGS=0V, -1V and -4V for the circuit in Example 2

JFET Biasing

Self Bias Voltage Divider Bias

Find VDS and VGS ? Find ID and VGS if VD = 7V?

Derive a generalized equation for Generalized equations for VS,VG,VGS,ID

VDS using VDD,ID,RD,RS ? using RD,RS, R1,R2 ?

Difference between BJT and FET (please don’t memorise)

 Bipolar junction transistors are bipolar devices, in this transistor there is a flow of both
majority & minority charge carriers.
 Field effect transistors are unipolar devices, in this transistor there are only the majority
charge carriers flows.
 Bipolar junction transistors are current controlled.
 Field effect transistors are voltage controlled.
 In many applications FETs are used than bipolar junction transistors.
 Bipolar junction transistor consist of three terminals namely emitter, base and collector.
These terminals are denoted by E, B and C.
 Field effect transistor consist of three terminals namely source, drain and gate. These
terminals are denoted by S, D and G.
 The input impedance of field effect transistors has high compared with bipolar junction
transistors.
 A BJT needs a small amount of current to switch on the transistor. The heat dissipated on
bipolar stops the total number of transistors that can be fabricated on the chip.
 Whenever the ‘G’ terminal of the FET transistor has been charged, no more current is
required to keep the transistor ON.
 The BJT is responsible for overheating due to a negative temperature co-efficient.
 FET has a +Ve temperature coefficient for stopping over heating.

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 BJTs are applicable for low current applications.
 FETS are applicable for low voltage applications.
 FETs have low to medium gain.
 BJTs have a higher max frequency and a higher cutoff frequency.

Advantages
1. BJT'S are highly noisy devices than the JFET's.
2. BJT's causes much and more loading effect than that of the FET's. Which is
the major disadvantage of using BJT in circuit where loading effect should
be avoided.
3. FET's are faster switching devices than that of the BJT. Because FET is
majority carrier device.
4. FET's are smaller than BJT, thus FET takes lesser area on semiconductor
die and they have higher input impedance than that of the BJT.
5. BJT's I-V characteristics are linear while FET's have non-linear
characteristics. Thus it's the advantages of using the BJT in its linear region
for amplification process rather than using the FET.
6. Thermal stability of FET's are higher than the BJT's, because FET’S are
unipolar devices that is current flow in FET depends upon the majority
carriers only.

MOSFET (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor)

There are 2 types of MOSFETs

Depletion (D-MOSFET) Enhancement (E-MOSFET)

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Example4: For a certain D-MOSFET, IDSS
=10mA and VGS(off) = -8V
(a) Is this an n-channel or a p-channel?
(b) Calculate ID at VGS = -3V
(c) Calculate ID as VGD = 3V
Example5: The data sheet for a 2N7008E-
MOSFET gives ID(ON) = 500mA at VGS=10V
and VGS(th) =1V. Determine the drain current
for VGS=5V

Example6: Study the below graphs and draw the transfer characteristic curves for (a) VDS=10V and
(b) VDS=40V

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Example7: Find Vo for (a) Vi=0, Vi=5V. And plot the load line

Complementary MOSFET (CMOS)

A Complementary MOSFET is obtained by connecting a p-channel and n-channel MOSFET in
series, with drains tied together and the output is taken at the common drain point.

What is Vo when Vi = 0V ?

What is Vo when Vi = +Vcc?

What is the quiescent/static power

dissipation?

(NMOS are considered to be faster than

PMOS, since the carriers in NMOS, which
are electrons, travel twice as fast as holes.)

Q: List some advantages of CMOS?

References: Modern Digital Electronics – 4th Edition, R P Jain