Summary
At high injection levels occurring in power thyristors, the injected carrier concentration may exceed several times the impurity concentration for the lightly doped regions. As a result, semiconductor and device properties are significantly modified as compared to those at moderate or low injection levels.
Due to the presence of a large and equal number of mobile carriers, it is convenient to use the concept of an ambipolar mobility and diffusivity.
At high-carrier-injection levels the mobilities and diffusivities are functions of current density.
Lifetime may be very much affected due to the Auger recombination mechanism, if the injected carrier density is on the order of 1018 carriers cm3
The two other effects of importance at high injection levels are the gain fall-off with current and the presence of a non-negligible voltage drop across p+p or n+n junctions.
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Blicher, A. (1976). Some high-injection-level effects. In: Thyristor Physics. Applied Physics and Engineering, vol 12. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-9877-9_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-9877-9_4
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