Saturation velocity

rdf:langString Saturation velocity

rdf:langString Saturation velocity is the maximum velocity a charge carrier in a semiconductor, generally an electron, attains in the presence of very high electric fields. When this happens, the semiconductor is said to be in a state of velocity saturation. Charge carriers normally move at an average drift speed proportional to the electric field strength they experience temporally. The proportionality constant is known as mobility of the carrier, which is a material property. A good conductor would have a high mobility value for its charge carrier, which means higher velocity, and consequently higher current values for a given electric field strength. There is a limit though to this process and at some high field value, a charge carrier can not move any faster, having reached its saturation velocity, due to mechanisms that eventually limit the movement of the carriers in the material. As the applied electric field increases from that point, the carrier velocity no longer increases because the carriers lose energy through increased levels of interaction with the lattice, by emitting phonons and even photons as soon as the carrier energy is large enough to do so.