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Silicon bandgap temperature sensor

 

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Silicon bandgap temperature sensor


 
 

The silicon bandgap temperature sensor is an extremely common form of temperature sensor used in electronic equipment. Its main advantage is that it can be included in a silicon integrated circuitIntegrated circuit Summary

A monolithic integrated circuit is a miniaturized electronic circuit which has been manufactured in the surface of a thin ...
 at very low cost. The principle of the sensor is that the forward voltage of a siliconSilicon

Silicon is the chemical element in the periodic table that has the symbol Si and atomic number 14....
 diodeDiode

In electronics, a diode is a component that restricts the direction of movement of charge carriers....
 is temperature-dependent, according to the following equation:
where
T = temperature in kelvinKelvin

The Kelvin scale is a temperature scale where absolute zero—the coldest possible temperature where there is no heat en...
s
VG0 = bandgap voltage at absolute zeroAbsolute zero

Absolute zero is the point on the thermodynamic temperature scale where the heat energy is at a minimum, that is, no more h...
VBE0 = bandgap voltage at temperature T0 and current IC0
K = Boltzmann's constant
q = charge on an electronElectron

The electron is a fundamental subatomic particle that carries an electric charge....
n = a device-dependent constant

By comparing the bandgap voltages at two different currents, IC1 and IC2, many of the variables in the above equation can be eliminated, resulting in the relationship:
An electronic circuit, such as the Brokaw bandgap referenceBrokaw bandgap reference

Brokaw bandgap reference is a voltage reference circuit widely used in integrated circuits, with an output voltage around 1....
, that measures ?VBE can therefore be used to calculate the temperature of the diode. The result remains valid up to about 200 °C to 250 °C, when leakage currents become large enough to corrupt the measurement. Above these temperatures, materials such as silicon carbideSilicon carbide

| Silicon carbide|-| align="center" colspan="2" | |-...
 can be used instead of silicon.