Electronic Design

Bipolar Junction Transistor (BJT)

Minh Thuy LE
Department of Instrumentation and Industrial Informatics (3I),
School of Electrical Engineering (SEE),
Hanoi University of Science and Technology (HUST), Vietnam

thuy.leminh@hust.edu.vn

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Contents
1. Introduction
2. Structure of BJT
3. BJT Operation
4. Practice exercise

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Contents
1. Introduction
2. Structure of BJT
3. BJT Operation
4. Practice exercise

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 1. Introduction
• BJT was invented in 1948 at Bell Telephone Lab
• MOSFETs were known before BJTs, but they have only
become widely used in IC manufacture since the 1980s.
• Nowadays BJT is employed in:
- High-power electronic components
- High-frequency IC
• Applications:
- Electronic devices in automotive
- Wireless communication devices

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Contents
1. Introduction
2. Structure of BJT
3. BJT Operation
4. Practice exercise

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2. Structure of BJT

npn-type BJT

pnp-type BJT

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2. Structure of BJT

• BJT has 3 terminals:

- Emitter (E)
- Base (B)
- Collector (C)
• BJT has 2 p-n junctions:
- Emitter-base junction (EBJ)
- Collector-base junction (CBJ)
• The operation of BJT depends on the bias of these
p-n junctions

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Contents
1. Introduction
2. Structure of BJT
3. BJT Operation
4. Practice exercise

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3. BJT operation

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Active mode

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 Current in active mode

• EBJ is forward-biased
o Electrons diffuse from E → B
o Holes diffuse from B → E
o In the base, only a few electrons combine with
the holes, and most move closer to the CBJ.
• CBJ is reverse-biased
o Electrons in the base flow through CBJ under
the effect of electric field.
o A few holes from the collector flow through CBJ
into the base

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 Current in active mode

• If we see from E, B, C terminals, there are 3 currents:

iE, iB and iC, respectively:
iC =  iB
iE = iB + iC = (1 +  )iB

=
 +1
iC =  iE
- 𝛽: common emitter current gain
- 𝛼: common base current gain
- 𝛽 is normally very large (𝛼 ≈ 1)
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 Ebers-Moll (EM) model
• The EM model allows to define all
operating modes of the BJT.
• Ebers-Moll expression:
iE = iDE −  RiDC
iC = −iDC +  F iDE
 V  
iDE = iSE exp  BE  − 1
  VT  
  VBC  
iDC = iSC exp   − 1
 V
 T  
 F iSE =  RiSC EM model of npn

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 Active mode of pnp
• The operation of pnp is similar to pnp. npn
• The only difference is that the current is mainly
generated by the holes from E to B .

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Symbols of BJT

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 Current-voltage characteristic
• Characteristic IV curves:
- iC-vCB (iE = const)
- iC-vCE (iB = const)

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iC-vCB characteristic

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 iC-vCB characteristic
• Measure iC-vCB characteristic: For a specific value of iE, measure
iC when vCB varies.
• In the active region:
o ic slightly increases when vCB increases when iE is kept
constant → Early effect
o When vCB is large, ic increases rapidly → breakdown
phenomenon
o 𝛼 coefficient: has 2 definitions (in fact, these 2 coefficients
are not much different)
iC
  total 𝛼 coefficient or large signal 𝛼 coefficient
iE

iC
  small signal 𝛼 coefficient
iE vCB = const
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 iC-vCB characteristic
• In the saturation region:
o vCB < -0.4 V
o Normally vBE = 0.7 V → vCE(saturation) = 0.1 to 0.3 V

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 Early effect
• In the active region:
o Ideally: iC = iE → iC-vCB characteristic is a horizontal line
o In fact: when vCB increases → ic increases → Early effect
• At the common emitter circuit (see the figure in the next
slide), for a specific vBE, we have different values of iC when vCE
varies
o According to EM model, when vBE = const, iC is slightly
dependent on vCE (because vBC < 0)
o In fact, iC may be dependent on vCE (or vBC)
o If we stretch iC-vCE lines in the active region, they will
intersect at the VA point called Early voltage (from 50 V to
100 V)

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Early effect

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iC-vCE characteristic

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 Active region
iC
 F   dc  DC current gain
iB

iC
ac = AC current gain
iB vCE = const

• The DC and AC current gains in practice often differ

from 10% to 20%
• dc depends on the Q-point
• For approximate analysis, we often assume that dc is
constant

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 Saturation region

• At the X point in
saturation region

iCsat  FiB
iCsat
 forced 
iB
 forced  F

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Contents
1. Introduction
2. Structure of BJT
3. BJT Operation
4. Practice exercise

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Exercise 1:

Determine 𝐼𝐵 , 𝐼𝐶 , 𝐼𝐸 , 𝑉𝐵 and 𝑉𝐶 where 𝛽𝐷𝐶 = 50

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 Exercise 2:
The manufacturer’s specification for a 2N3904 transistor shows
that 𝛽𝐷𝐶 has a range from 100 to 300. Assume a 2N3904 is used in
the base-biased circuit shown in the figure. Compute the
minimum and maximum collector current based on this
specification.

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 Exercise 3:
The manufacturer’s specification for a 2N3904 transistor shows
that 𝛽𝐷𝐶 has a range from 100 to 300. Assume a 2N3904 is used in
the collector-biased circuit shown in the figure. Compute the
minimum and maximum collector current based on this
specification.

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 Exercise 4:
Find 𝑉𝐵 , 𝑉𝐸 , 𝐼𝐸 , 𝐼𝐶 , and 𝑉𝐶𝐸 for the circuit in the figure

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