KWAME NKRUMAH UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY (KNUST), KUMASI.

COLLEGE OF SCIENCE

FACULTY OF COMPUTATIONAL AND PHYSICAL SCIENCE

DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS

EXPERIMENT TITLE:

AN EXPERIMENT TO DETERMINE I-V CHARACTERISTICS OF P N JUNCTION DIODE

EXPERIMENT NUMBER: 26

NAMES: KUORU ISAAC 4658818

KWAKYE ABAYIE SAMUEL 4658918

ABOAGYE GIDEON 4651218

GROUP ONE (3) DATE: 17/11/2019

1
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT ……………………………………………………………..3

INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………….. 4-5

THEORY ……………………………………………………………… 6-7

DIAGRAM OF SET-UP………………………………………………..8

TABLE OF RESULTS ………………………………………………… 9-10

GRAPHS ……………………………………………………………

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS …………………………………….

CONCLUSIONS ………………………………………………………... 18

REFERENCES …………………………………………………………… 19

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 ABSTRACT

V-I characteristics of PN junction diode was the purpose of the experiment conducted. A
semiconductor diode is formed by adding impurities (doping), P type impurity and N type
impurity at another of the semiconductor forming a PN junction. The set up was arranged by
connecting wire to it appropriate ports. During the experiment two tasked were performed. This
was to measure the voltages and current across the circuit by using a multi meter. The tasked
performed were forward biased and reserve biased respectively. The power supply, voltmeter
and current meter was connected with the diode as shown in fig 2 and 3.

In forward biased diode, the current is negligible until the voltage reaches the bias voltage of
0.65V. During the experiment, the values of the voltages obtained for the forward biased were as
follows (0.09, 0.22, 0.42, 0.47, 0.50, 0.53, 0.58, 0.63, 0.64, 0.66, 0.67, 0.69, 0.71) V and also
current obtained for forward biased are (0.00, 0.00, 0.00, 0.01, 0.02, 0.04, 1.30, 3.30,5.40,
7.40,9.40,14.50,19.60) respectively. With this value obtained surely indicate that as the supply
voltage increases, diode voltage and current also increase. The second tasked was conducted
(reverse biased). For reverse biased, there is no current flowing through the diode. Diode voltage
obtained for reverse biased are (0.09, 2.04, 5.02, 10.04, 15.04, 20.02, 30.10) and value recorded
for diode current is zero which is constant throughout. When voltage is not applied across the
diode depletion region form while when voltage is applied between the terminals of the diode
(anode and cathode) two possibilities arose depending on the parity of the DC supply.
 THEORY

Depletion region forms when voltage is not applied across the diode. Two possibilities arise
depending on polarity of DC supply when the voltage is applied between the two terminals of the
diode (anode and cathode). Forward –Bias condition occurred when the positive terminal of the
battery is connected to p-type material and negative terminal to N type terminal, the diode is said
to be forward biased. The application for forward bias voltage will force the electron in N type
and holes in P type materials to recombine with the ions near boundary and to flow crossing
junction. This reduces width of depletion region. This further will result in increase in majority
carriers flow across the junction. The reduce width is the depletion region. This further will
result in increase in majority carriers flow across the junction. If forward bias is further increased
in magnitude the depletion region width will continue to decrease, resulting in exponential rise in
current. In the reverse biased mode, the negative terminal of battery is connected to the P type
terminal of the diode and positive terminal connected to N type. The free charge in this condition
will move away from the junction widening depletion width. The negative electrons in P type
and positive hole in N type which is considered as the minority carriers can cross the depletion
region resulting in minority carrier current flow which is called Reverse Saturation current (Is).
In conclusion, current flows through diode in forward bias and does not flow through in reverse
bias. Diode can pass current only in one direction.
DIAGRAM OF SET UP FOR I-V CHARACTERISTICS OF PN JUNCTION DIODE

A well labelled Diagram illustrating the experimental set-up of I-V characteristics of PN

Fig. 1
Circuit diagram for Reverse bias.

Fig. 2

Circuit diagram for Forward bias.

Fig. 3
 TABLE OF RESULTS

Observation Table (Forward Bias)

Table 1.

Serial Number Supply voltage Diode voltage (Vd) Diode current (Id)
(Volt)

1 0 0.09 0.00

2 0.2 0.22 0.00

3 0.4 0.42 0.00

4 0.6 0.47 0.01

5 0.8 0.50 0.02

6 1 0.53 0.04

7 2 0.58 1.30

8 4 0.62 3.30

9 6 0.64 5.40

10 8 0.66 7.40

11 10 0.67 9.40

12 15 0.69 14.50

13 20 0.71 19.60
Observation Table (Reverse Bias)

Table 2.

Serial Number Supply voltage Diode voltage (Vd) Diode current (Id)
(Volt)

1 0 0.09 0.00

2 2 2.04 0.00

3 5 5.02 0.00

4 10 10.04 0.00

5 15 15.04 0.00

6 20 20.08 0.00

7 25 25.02 0.00

8 30 30.10 0.00
V-I CHARACTERISTICS OF PN JUNCTION DIODE GRAPH FOR BOTH FORWARD
AND REVERSE BIAS

Forward bias graph

V-I graph of forward bias

20

15
current/I

10

0
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8
voltage/V

Fig. 3
Reverse bias graph

V-I graph for reverse bias

0.9

0.8

0.7

0.6
Axis Title

0.5

0.4

0.3

0.2

0.1

0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Axis Title

Fig. 2
 RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

The set up were arranged as shown in fig 1. The power supply, ammeter, resister and diode were
in a series connection. The ammeter was connected to measure the amount of current flowing
through the circuit, the resister too reduces excessive current from entering the diode to prevent it
from damage. For the forward biased, the voltmeter was connected parallel to the diode with its
positive terminal to the positive terminal of the diode and the negative to the negative terminal of
the diode to measure the voltage across it. In the case of the reverse biased the polarity of the
voltage supplied was interchanged with all other apparatus still in their positions.

From the V-I graph of the forward biased, the diode forward voltage increases along the voltage
axis and the diode current too increases along the current axis. The current increases very little
until the voltage across the pn-junction increases to approximately 0.7v. At this point the curve
moves upward as the current continuously increases with little increment of voltage.

For the reverse biased, it was observed that the graph moved along the current axis because, the
voltage that was supplied to the diode was not enough to reach the breakdown voltage which
could cause the reduction of the depletion region in the diode thereby caused it to conduct
electric current. The resistor in the circuit too had an effect of reducing the amount of the current
flowing through the circuit. After viewing the graph and for the purpose of easy conductivity, it
is advisable to connect a diode in the forward biased form in a circuit.

From our experiment conducted, the important parameters of the diode is high current and low
forward voltage. Breakdown voltage is the maximum reverse voltage that makes the diode
conduct appreciably in reverse. The maximum forward current diode in 1N4007 is 30amp. Some
of the applications of diode involved the rectifying a voltage such as turning voltage in AC and
DC, isolating signal from a supply, controlling the size of a signal and also mixing signals.
 CONCLUSION

In the experiment conducted, the main objective was achieved, that is the I-V characteristics of
PN junction diode for forward and reverse bias was successfully verified. The experiment was
performed in two stages, the first was the forward bias and the second was reverse bias. It was
observed that, as the diode vo0ltage increased, the diode current also increased. Also, from the
forward biased graph, a current plotted on the vertical axis against voltage on the horizontal axis
to produce a positive slope. Due to this observation, it can be concluded that, diode permit
current to move in the forward direction or connection. Whereas in reverse bias, no current flows
through the diode since the I-V graph produced a zero slope. With the observations stated above
which include the I-V characteristics of PN junction diode, it can be recommended and may be
used a method for verifying the I-V characteristics.
 REFERENCE

1. Semiconductor Radiant Diode, James R. Biard and Gary Pittman, filled on August 8th,
1982, issued on December 20th, 1966
2. Edwards, Kimberly D. “P N Junction diode”. University of California
3. The optoelectronics Research Centre, University of Southampton April 2007.
4. Washington DC, Massachusetts institute of technology. April 21, 2004.