Bi Polar Junction Transistor (BJT): Introduction, Construction and Working

Introduction:

BJT stands for Bipolar Junction transistor which means two polar junctions. The reason it is called Bipolar is that it uses both electrons and holes for carrying charge or to flow the current. While FET is known as a unipolar transistor.

Construction:

As we have discussed diode before, and how it is formed by the junction of two regions, P doped region, and n doped region. The BJT is formed by the combination of two back to back diodes. The Bipolar junction transistor or BJT has two junctions of the semiconductor. In one of the two types (PNP), a thin n-region is shared by two p-regions. And in another type (NPN), a thin p-region is shared by two n-regions, the figure below explains this.

          Fig (a)

                                                                                 Fig (b)

                                   

This complete structure of BJT has three terminals and has three layers. Each terminal for each layer. And the names of these layers are Emitter, Base, and collector shown in above figure. For NPN the arrow is going away from the Emitter terminal and for PNP the arrow is towards the emitter terminal. The reason is explained later.

 Functions of BJT:

BJT can be used for three purposes,

• Current controlling
• switching
• Amplification

Controlling Current:

BJTs are mostly used for controlling the amount of current flows from emitter to collector or collector to base. These are two cases for two different types of BJT (which are PNP and NPN). In PNP the current goes from Collector to emitter with the combination or addition of base current, see fig (a). While in NPN the current goes from Emitter to collector with separation or removal of base current see fig (b). In all this, the current which goes from emitter to collector or collector to emitter is the controlling current and the current which goes or comes from the base is controlled current. Now all this statement means that, the amount of current which have to go from emitter to collector in NPN transistor is decided by or controlled by the current flows towards the base as shown in the below picture.

           Fig(c)

                                                                                    Fig(d)

         

                                                                                          

Equations of current:

This thing also produce the equation of current,

I_E = I_B + I_C

Where I_E is the Emitter current, I_B is the base current and, I_C is collector current.

I_B = I_E - I_C

I_C = I_E - I_B