Key Terms Flashcards
Conductor
A material that has very low resistance and easily passes an electric current. Most good
conductors are metals, such as copper, aluminium and silver.
Insulator
A material that has very high resistance. It is generally a non-metal. Examples of good insulators include plastics and rubber.
Semiconductor
A material such as silicon (Si),
germanium (Ge) or gallium arsenide (GaAs) that has electrical properties somewhere between those of a conductor and an insulator.
What are pure semiconductor materials called?
intrinsic semiconductors
Extrinsic semiconductors contain very small amounts of…
impurity chosen to increase the
conductivity.
The introduction of measured
amounts of impurity is called…
doping.
Anode
the connection to the p-type material.
Cathode
the connection to the n-type material
Forward bias
describes a diode where the anode is
more positive than the cathode.
Reverse bias
describes a diode where the anode is
more negative than the cathode.
Barrier potential
the minimum forward bias voltage needed for conduction to start.
Majority carriers
the charge carriers due to doping,
which are holes in p-type material and electrons in n-type material.
Minority carriers
the holes in n-type material
and electrons in p-type material due to thermally generated hole–electron pairs in the silicon lattice.
Back e.m.f.
A voltage in the reverse direction which results from a current through an inductor being switched.
Voltage gain
The ratio of voltage output to voltage
input.
