Where does the labelling of extrinsic semiconductors as “n” and “p” come from?
$begingroup$
The naming of doped semiconductors as "n-type" (for donor-doped) and "p-type" (for acceptor-doped) is ubiquitous. But I am having a hard time digging up where this naming tradition comes from and how it has come to be so widely accepted. From my perspective, there is nothing intuitive about this choice of notation. Henceforth the question:
Where does the tradition of labelling donor-doped extrinsic semiconductors as "n" and acceptor-doped as "p" come from?
semiconductor-physics history
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
$endgroup$
add a comment |
$begingroup$
The naming of doped semiconductors as "n-type" (for donor-doped) and "p-type" (for acceptor-doped) is ubiquitous. But I am having a hard time digging up where this naming tradition comes from and how it has come to be so widely accepted. From my perspective, there is nothing intuitive about this choice of notation. Henceforth the question:
Where does the tradition of labelling donor-doped extrinsic semiconductors as "n" and acceptor-doped as "p" come from?
semiconductor-physics history
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
$endgroup$
add a comment |
$begingroup$
The naming of doped semiconductors as "n-type" (for donor-doped) and "p-type" (for acceptor-doped) is ubiquitous. But I am having a hard time digging up where this naming tradition comes from and how it has come to be so widely accepted. From my perspective, there is nothing intuitive about this choice of notation. Henceforth the question:
Where does the tradition of labelling donor-doped extrinsic semiconductors as "n" and acceptor-doped as "p" come from?
semiconductor-physics history
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
$endgroup$
The naming of doped semiconductors as "n-type" (for donor-doped) and "p-type" (for acceptor-doped) is ubiquitous. But I am having a hard time digging up where this naming tradition comes from and how it has come to be so widely accepted. From my perspective, there is nothing intuitive about this choice of notation. Henceforth the question:
Where does the tradition of labelling donor-doped extrinsic semiconductors as "n" and acceptor-doped as "p" come from?
semiconductor-physics history
semiconductor-physics history
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
asked 1 hour ago
Ignat InsarovIgnat Insarov
1062
1062
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
New contributor
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |
add a comment |
2 Answers
2
active
oldest
votes
$begingroup$
For semiconductors, n-type mainly refers to Negative electrons which are the major charge carriers, whereas p-type refers to Positive, indicating holes which are the majority charge carriers (in this case), and can be thought of as positive.
In short, it tells us about the majority charge carriers in a particular type of semiconductor.
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
$endgroup$
add a comment |
$begingroup$
I want to supplement Eagle's answer.
Long before people deliberately doped semiconductors, physicists were studying samples of crystalline germanium.
While playing with these crystals, some seem to act as if they had a few n or negative carriers in them, and others seemed to have p or positive carriers in them.
At first it was not understood why they behaved this way, and the the naming convention long predates their use in electronics.
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
$endgroup$
1
$begingroup$
So I should understand those germanium crystals were rather impure?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
24 mins ago
$begingroup$
Actually, can you refer me to the records of those early experiments?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
6 mins ago
add a comment |
Your Answer
StackExchange.ready(function() {
var channelOptions = {
tags: "".split(" "),
id: "151"
};
initTagRenderer("".split(" "), "".split(" "), channelOptions);
StackExchange.using("externalEditor", function() {
// Have to fire editor after snippets, if snippets enabled
if (StackExchange.settings.snippets.snippetsEnabled) {
StackExchange.using("snippets", function() {
createEditor();
});
}
else {
createEditor();
}
});
function createEditor() {
StackExchange.prepareEditor({
heartbeatType: 'answer',
autoActivateHeartbeat: false,
convertImagesToLinks: false,
noModals: true,
showLowRepImageUploadWarning: true,
reputationToPostImages: null,
bindNavPrevention: true,
postfix: "",
imageUploader: {
brandingHtml: "Powered by u003ca class="icon-imgur-white" href="https://imgur.com/"u003eu003c/au003e",
contentPolicyHtml: "User contributions licensed under u003ca href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/"u003ecc by-sa 3.0 with attribution requiredu003c/au003e u003ca href="https://stackoverflow.com/legal/content-policy"u003e(content policy)u003c/au003e",
allowUrls: true
},
noCode: true, onDemand: true,
discardSelector: ".discard-answer"
,immediatelyShowMarkdownHelp:true
});
}
});
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
StackExchange.ready(
function () {
StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fphysics.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f476627%2fwhere-does-the-labelling-of-extrinsic-semiconductors-as-n-and-p-come-from%23new-answer', 'question_page');
}
);
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
2 Answers
2
active
oldest
votes
2 Answers
2
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
$begingroup$
For semiconductors, n-type mainly refers to Negative electrons which are the major charge carriers, whereas p-type refers to Positive, indicating holes which are the majority charge carriers (in this case), and can be thought of as positive.
In short, it tells us about the majority charge carriers in a particular type of semiconductor.
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
$endgroup$
add a comment |
$begingroup$
For semiconductors, n-type mainly refers to Negative electrons which are the major charge carriers, whereas p-type refers to Positive, indicating holes which are the majority charge carriers (in this case), and can be thought of as positive.
In short, it tells us about the majority charge carriers in a particular type of semiconductor.
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
$endgroup$
add a comment |
$begingroup$
For semiconductors, n-type mainly refers to Negative electrons which are the major charge carriers, whereas p-type refers to Positive, indicating holes which are the majority charge carriers (in this case), and can be thought of as positive.
In short, it tells us about the majority charge carriers in a particular type of semiconductor.
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
$endgroup$
For semiconductors, n-type mainly refers to Negative electrons which are the major charge carriers, whereas p-type refers to Positive, indicating holes which are the majority charge carriers (in this case), and can be thought of as positive.
In short, it tells us about the majority charge carriers in a particular type of semiconductor.
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
answered 57 mins ago
EagleEagle
3551217
3551217
add a comment |
add a comment |
$begingroup$
I want to supplement Eagle's answer.
Long before people deliberately doped semiconductors, physicists were studying samples of crystalline germanium.
While playing with these crystals, some seem to act as if they had a few n or negative carriers in them, and others seemed to have p or positive carriers in them.
At first it was not understood why they behaved this way, and the the naming convention long predates their use in electronics.
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
$endgroup$
1
$begingroup$
So I should understand those germanium crystals were rather impure?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
24 mins ago
$begingroup$
Actually, can you refer me to the records of those early experiments?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
6 mins ago
add a comment |
$begingroup$
I want to supplement Eagle's answer.
Long before people deliberately doped semiconductors, physicists were studying samples of crystalline germanium.
While playing with these crystals, some seem to act as if they had a few n or negative carriers in them, and others seemed to have p or positive carriers in them.
At first it was not understood why they behaved this way, and the the naming convention long predates their use in electronics.
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
$endgroup$
1
$begingroup$
So I should understand those germanium crystals were rather impure?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
24 mins ago
$begingroup$
Actually, can you refer me to the records of those early experiments?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
6 mins ago
add a comment |
$begingroup$
I want to supplement Eagle's answer.
Long before people deliberately doped semiconductors, physicists were studying samples of crystalline germanium.
While playing with these crystals, some seem to act as if they had a few n or negative carriers in them, and others seemed to have p or positive carriers in them.
At first it was not understood why they behaved this way, and the the naming convention long predates their use in electronics.
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
$endgroup$
I want to supplement Eagle's answer.
Long before people deliberately doped semiconductors, physicists were studying samples of crystalline germanium.
While playing with these crystals, some seem to act as if they had a few n or negative carriers in them, and others seemed to have p or positive carriers in them.
At first it was not understood why they behaved this way, and the the naming convention long predates their use in electronics.
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
answered 36 mins ago
Paul YoungPaul Young
1,476318
1,476318
1
$begingroup$
So I should understand those germanium crystals were rather impure?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
24 mins ago
$begingroup$
Actually, can you refer me to the records of those early experiments?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
6 mins ago
add a comment |
1
$begingroup$
So I should understand those germanium crystals were rather impure?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
24 mins ago
$begingroup$
Actually, can you refer me to the records of those early experiments?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
6 mins ago
1
1
$begingroup$
So I should understand those germanium crystals were rather impure?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
24 mins ago
$begingroup$
So I should understand those germanium crystals were rather impure?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
24 mins ago
$begingroup$
Actually, can you refer me to the records of those early experiments?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
6 mins ago
$begingroup$
Actually, can you refer me to the records of those early experiments?
$endgroup$
– Ignat Insarov
6 mins ago
add a comment |
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Ignat Insarov is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Thanks for contributing an answer to Physics Stack Exchange!
- Please be sure to answer the question. Provide details and share your research!
But avoid …
- Asking for help, clarification, or responding to other answers.
- Making statements based on opinion; back them up with references or personal experience.
Use MathJax to format equations. MathJax reference.
To learn more, see our tips on writing great answers.
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
StackExchange.ready(
function () {
StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fphysics.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f476627%2fwhere-does-the-labelling-of-extrinsic-semiconductors-as-n-and-p-come-from%23new-answer', 'question_page');
}
);
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
