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Reverse leakage current in a semiconductor device is the current when the device is reverse biased.. Under reverse bias, an ideal semiconductor device should not conduct any current, however, due to attraction of dissimilar charges, the positive side of the voltage source draws free electrons (majority carriers in the n-region) away from the P-N junction.
p–n junctions represent the simplest case of a semiconductor electronic device; a p-n junction by itself, when connected on both sides to a circuit, is a diode. More complex circuit components can be created by further combinations of p-type and n-type semiconductors; for example, the bipolar junction transistor (BJT) is a semiconductor in ...
Shockley derives an equation for the voltage across a p-n junction in a long article published in 1949. [2] Later he gives a corresponding equation for current as a function of voltage under additional assumptions, which is the equation we call the Shockley ideal diode equation. [3]
Under a high reverse-bias voltage, the p-n junction's depletion region widens which leads to a high-strength electric field across the junction. [2] Sufficiently strong electric fields enable tunneling of electrons across the depletion region of a semiconductor , leading to numerous free charge carriers .
A normally-bound electron (e.g., in a bond) in a reverse-biased diode may break loose due to a thermal fluctuation or excitation, creating a mobile electron-hole pair . If there is a voltage gradient (electric field) in the semiconductor, then the electron will move towards the positive voltage while the hole will move towards the negative voltage.
The diffusion current and drift current together are described by the drift–diffusion equation. [1] It is necessary to consider the part of diffusion current when describing many semiconductor devices. For example, the current near the depletion region of a p–n junction is dominated by the diffusion current. Inside the depletion region ...
The saturation current (or scale current), more accurately the reverse saturation current, is the part of the reverse current in a semiconductor diode caused by diffusion of minority carriers from the neutral regions to the depletion region. This current is almost independent of the reverse voltage.
The effect of reverse saturation current on the I-V curve of a crystalline silicon solar cell are shown in the figure to the right. Physically, reverse saturation current is a measure of the "leakage" of carriers across the p–n junction in reverse bias.