br Ems @ trons that do leave their parent atom are termed free => Ina metal like copper, platinum or tungsten, there’ are ts, Plenty of free electrons. At room temperature these elec- trons are free only to the extent that they may transfer from one atom to another within the metal but they cannot leave {ihe various energy states of the atoms of the simpler the metal surface “A free electron cannot escape from the cen be calculated theoretically, these levels must be metal surface because 1 pulled back by the positively ined indirectly from spectroscopic and other data for charged atom. The force exerted at the surface of metal that Energy Level Diagram For Mercury fated atoms, Prevents the free electrons from escaping. is called the surface 4 barrier. The attractive surface forces tend to keep the elec- IONIZATION LEVEL OF MERCURY {rons within the metal surface, except for a small portion that * happens to have sufficient kinetic energy to breakthrough the energy barrier caused by these forces. The majority of ele trons move too slowly for this to happen The electrons are required to perform a certain amount of work to overcome the restraining forces in order that = a f 10140 they may escape out of the surface of a metal. To do this 3 work the electrons must be imparted with sufficient energy | * 8 from some external source of energy, since their own ki. s 1 netic energy is inadequate. The amount of energy required = T = for the escape of electrons varies with different materials tig ie, electron emission can take place more easily in some BRAT] materials than in others. Hi ' Modern physics tells us that even at the absolute zero ° temperature, the velocity (or kinetic energy) of all the elec. BE Re NBCU trot dacs! notinitots acto ae many electrons that Fig. 3.3. Lower Energy Levels of Atomic Mercury Possess appreciable energy. The maximum energy that an 2 experimentally determined energly-level diagram for electron in a metal has, at the absolute zero temperature, is 1 ebicted in Fig. 3.3. The numbers tothe left of the called the Fermi level of energy and is designated ve E,. IF Ep tal lines indicate the energy of these levels in electzon is the total barier an electron has to overecane icy coming out he arrows represent some of the transitions that have of the metal surface, the additional ‘energy required to be imparted a cuit im actual spectra, the attached numbers © an electron at absolute zero temperature to erable ink ng the wavelength of the emitted radiations in angstrom escape out will be equal to Ey ~ E,. This additional energy i.e, = 107" m). The light emitted in these transitions gives E, ~ Ey is called the work function of the metal and is tc luminous character of the gaseous discharge. However, designated as Ew or 6 that is ‘ed radiation need not appear in the form of visible light, Ey or 6=B,-E, 3.8) existin the ultraviolet or infrared regions. Its customary ss the energy value of the stationary states in electron her than in joules. Also, itis more common to specify tted radiation by its wavelength A in angstroms rather frequency in hertz, This may be written in the form In other words, the work function (E, may be defined as the or 9) of a metal 12,400 ‘ork function is electron volt, already de- G.7) 1 fined in Art, 2.4, lowest energy state is called the normal level, and the ‘The work function of a metal depends upon the nature Fy uutes Of the atom are &nown as excited, of the metal, and the surface condi Thus different metals & critica. or resonance levels. The most intense line in have different work functions Metals employed for electron Oy eet nim is that resulting from the transition from emission should have low work function so'that a small €V level to the zero state, The emitted radiation is amount of energy is required for electron emission, 12.400 9 374 There are several methods by which electron emission 488 ~ . can be brought about. In all these methods the electrons are ated in the energy level diagram (Fig. 3.3) Supplied with energy in one form of the other in a quantity, Primarily this line that is responsible for the ultraviolet from which they obtain kinetic energy sufficient to ov. hich arise from mercury discharges, Come the surface restraint. Some of these methods are di cussed below, LECTRON EMISSION AND WORK FUNCTION =>3.4, THERMIONIC EMISSION :ration of electrons from the surface of a substance is as electron emission. For electron emission, metals A very common method used for elect emission is by |of electron emission from the surface of metal into the sur- rounding space by heating the material is known as thermionic emission, As the temperature of, tal piece rises, a point Cee etic on of al (EREREIID nti ene) ovens he messing ‘surface ses and the electrons emit from the metal surface. ‘The process of electron. emission is similar to that of evapo- ration when liquid is heated ie. the electrons seem to “boil off” the metal when its temperature is raised to a certain level. ‘A surface that is used to provide flow of electrons by the thermionic emission is called a hot cathode. The thermionic emissior . Moreover, the ee metal én of the’ temperature. Hence the thermionic emitters are heated either the emitter, which is made of high resistance wire of the required metal. For obtaining higher efficiency thermionic emitter is made of material with low work function so that material can be operated at low temperature. The number of electrons ‘evaporated’ per unit area of an emitting surface depends upon the absolute temperature, T (Kelvins) of the emitter and thermionic work function for the particular combination of emitting surface and surrounding atmosphere, b. The emission current is given by the equa- tion derived by O.W. Richardson, also known as Richardson Dushman equation, as below roo G9) where J, is the emission current density in amperes/m?; T is the temperature of surface in K; A is a proportionality constant, also called the Plank’s constant, in amperes/m?/K?, b is a constant of the emitter in Kelvin’s and e is the natural loga- rithmic base and equal to 2.7183. The value of A is the same for most pure metals (ap- proximately 600,000) but varies widely for the practical emitters. The value of b remains constant for the metal and varies slightly with the temperature. The value of b is given by the equation Ge 4c = Ox1602 x10" Kk’ 138x107 b 1,6009 K _...3.10) coulomb and k’ ig and is equal to ‘hoe ERE WERE Seren the emitting surface in eV; and e is equal to electron charge i. i From the above equation, we see that in order to get cither the work functio Also it is clear that if the worl function can be halved by choosing suitable material, the absolute temperature can be halved without altering the value of the exponential factor. ‘A few approximate values of the constants for certain metals are given below in the tabular form. ‘The Dushman relation serves for design of thermionic devices and also points out a current limit imposed on their operation. This maximum current which can be obiained Electronic Devices and Circuits from thermal electron source at-a given temperature is called the temperature saturation value. “=> TABLE 3.1. Thermionie Emission Data Material | Ais | binK | @ia]” Meling Aint ev | Point in K Carbon ea xo | s4soo | 47 Cesium 62x 10° | 21.00 | 181) 301 Molybdenum | 602 x 10° | 49.900 | 43 895 Nickel 268 x 10° | 58,000 | 5.0 1,725 Thorium | 602x 10° | 39400 | 34] 2118 Tungsten 602 x 10° + 2,400 | 452]. 3.655 | Electron tubes are operated in a fairly narrow tempera- ture range—the lower limit being fixed by sufficient emis- siony"and the" upper limit by evaporation or melting of the emitter material. The ‘curve showing the relation between the emission cur- rent density (amperes/m”) and temperature (K) for tungsten in its normal op- crating range is illustrated 9 in Fig. 3.4, emission current DENSHIY NA! 3.4.1. The Schottky Effect ‘The presence of makes only quantitative difference us the full emission current is rarely drawn'from the cathode. The Schottky effect is not to be-confused with high field emission which needs much more intense electric field. Example 3.1. cylindrical thoriated tungsten cathode is 40 mm Jong and 0.2 mm in diameter. Determine the emission current ‘when it is raised to a temperature of 2,000 K. Thermionic emission constants are A= 6% 10! amperevm2/K? and @ = 34 electron volts. 1,602 «107! Solution : Constant p = 2° © 1.9210" 339,470 138x107 Emission current density ape®t 6 x 10! x (2,000)? x @ 2” Afm? 10!” x 2,6866 x 10° 644.8 Alm? RDIE nx 02x 107 x 40x 107 = 25:13 x 10° m? 644.8 x 25-13 x 10% 062A Ans. Emitting surface, S Emission-current = J, x S 3.5. CONTACT POTENTIAL Letus consider two metals 1 and 2 in contact with each other, asa the junction Jin Fig. 3.5. The contact difference Of potential betweeAlthough the secondary emission is an accidental phenom- enon and often considered undesirable in certain electron devices, it is used to advantage in many electron devices e.g., cathode- ray tubes, electron multiplier tubes, dynatron oscillators, storage tubes in radar arid electronic computers etc, Secondary emission, no doubt, does not affect the operation of diode but certainly affects the operation of vacuum tubes having more than two electrodes. In fact secondary emission is responsible for the ve resistance characteristic of a tetrode. 3.7@FIEDDIEMISSIONIOR COLD CATHODE EMISSION ‘The metal piece inelectrons by creating a uch an emission of electrons is known as field emission or cold cathode emission. If an electrode (anode) having sufficiently high positive potential with respect to the metal piece (cathode) is brought ‘near it (cathode), it (anode) will attract the electrons with such a force that electrons will emit from the surface of the emitter (Fig. 3.7). This type of emission is almost independent of tem- perature and is a function of elec- tric field intensity. The relation between field emission current Savina _ pean id electric field intensity is ‘SURFACE = CONDUCTOR given by the following equation : ~ Fig. 3.7. Field Emission Phenomenon 1, S A,B 4’ (3,12) where Ip is the field emission current density, E is the elec- tric field intensity at the emitter surface: Ay'is am approxi- mately constant coefficient; b, is a’constani determined by the work function of the metal; and e is the natural loga- rithmic base. Very intense electric field (usually, a voltage of the order of million of volts per em distance between the emitting surface and the positive conductor) is required to produce field emission. Itcan be had at temperatures much lower (e.g. room temperature) than required for thermionic emission and, therefore, it is also sometimes called cold cathode emission. 3.8, PHOTOELECTRIC EMISSION When the surface of certai of light The phenomenon is cal Photoelectric emission. The work function of the alkaline materials is very low and therefore, when energy of the light radiations (called phoron) or the energy of the ultraviolet radiations (called quanta) fall on the alkaline material, gives sufficient energy to the free electrons of the material to speed up sufficiently to overcome the surface restraining forces of the metal and hence emission takes place The electrons emitted in this way are call e number of electrons emitted depends intensity (brightness) of the light beam falling upon the emitter surface and the frequency of radiations. This property is very useful for the measurement of intensity of illumination. In the photoelectric emission, the light supplies the work- function energy to free electrons from the surface. In this Electronic Deviees and Circuits application, light or radiant energy may be thought of as in bundles according to the usual theories. The energy per bundle, is related to the frequency of the light by W = /if= Quantum energy (3.13) where / is Planck's constant and is equal to 6626 x 10 joule- second and fis the frequency of light in hertz. The energy required to liberate an electron = 2.14) where ¢ = electronic charge and ¢ is the work function in elec- tron volts. Hence for a photon to cause emission © ' We eb or f2 2 The minimum frequency which can cause photoemission is called the threshold frequency and is given by fy = +G.1S) Now fy where cis the velocity of light “0 and is equal to 3 x 108 mis, Hence ‘threshold wavelength’ or “long wavelength limit’ is given by the equation eae fo e00 3x10* x 6.626 x 10™ 1-602 x 107” oo = DARIO in or 12400 ngs (3.16) % % Ifthe radiation is of wavelength greater than that given by the above Eq. (3.16), then photoemission will not occur at all If the frequency of incident radiation is greater than f, then incident radiation has more energy. This additional energy goes to impart kinetic energy to the emitted electrons. In that case, the energy relation becomes af =e0+ 5m? G17) where v is the miaxi- mum velocity of emission of the emitted electrons, If V is the in- hibiting voltage re- quired to reduce the velocity of emitted electrons to zero then hf eurrter’¢ =egtev =e(o+V) (3.18) The use of pho- toelectric emission Phenomenon is Fig 38 made in phototubes which form the basis of TV and sound films. The phenomenon of photoelectric emission is illustrated in Fig. 3.8. The emitter E and anode A are enclosed in an evacuated