What is tunneling in Zener breakdown?

What is tunneling in Zener breakdown?

Tunneling occurs when the depletion region is too thin due to high doping concentration P and N region. You can call it abrupt junction. When the temperature is increased, the current will increase or breakdown voltage decreases. This is due to the higher energy of charge carriers which will cross the barrier easily.

What are the two types of breakdown in Zener diode?

A zener diode has two distinctly different breakdown mechanisms: zener breakdown and avalanche breakdown. The zener breakdown voltage decreases as the temperature increases, creating a negative temperature coefficient (TC).

Why does zener breakdown occur?

The main cause of zener breakdown is high doping concentrations. The breakdown is a condition when upon increasing the voltage in small amounts; we experience a massive current flow in the device. Zener breakdown occurs when we apply reverse bias to a heavily doped diode.

What is the main difference between avalanche and zener breakdown?

The main difference between Zener breakdown and avalanche breakdown is their mechanism of occurrence. Zener breakdown occurs because of the high electric field whereas, the avalanche breakdown occurs because of the collision of free electrons with atoms. Both these breakdowns can occur simultaneously.

What happens when a zener diode is reversed?

This is because when the reverse voltage applied across the zener diode exceeds the rated voltage of the device a process called Avalanche Breakdown occurs in the semiconductor depletion layer and a current starts to flow through the diode to limit this increase in voltage.

What’s the difference between a diode and a Zener diode?

A diode is a semiconductor device which conducts in one direction only. A Zener diode is a semiconductor device which conducts in forward biased as well as reversed biased. A normal diode if operated in reversed biased will get destroyed.