[HN Gopher] To be or not to be a diode? It depends on temperatur...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       To be or not to be a diode? It depends on temperature gradient
        
       Author : WaitWaitWha
       Score  : 25 points
       Date   : 2022-12-07 17:32 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.electronicdesign.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.electronicdesign.com)
        
       | klodolph wrote:
       | I was curious how this worked, so I looked at the paper.
       | 
       | My first thought was just about how semiconductors worked in
       | general. You heat something up, you get electrons in excited
       | states, and this creates pairs of N carriers and P carriers. The
       | N carriers in common semiconductors used in industry have more
       | mobility than P carriers, is that what's causing the effect?
       | However, when I started thinking more about this idea, it made
       | less and less sense.
       | 
       | Turns out there's a phase change here! The phase change is a
       | reversible phase change alters the crystal structure enough to
       | change between majority N and majority P type carriers. The
       | temperature gradient is necessary to put the N type and P type
       | phases close enough together.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2022-12-07 23:01 UTC)