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Lecture

Polarisation and Current Sources: Practical Implementation and Considerations

Description

This lecture covers practical considerations for polarization schemes, including choosing the current in resistors, sizing of the polarization source, temperature independence, and the use of current mirrors for improved thermal stability.

In MOOC

Electronics II

Official source

Ontological neighbourhood

Physics

Electromagnetism: Electrical networks

Related concepts (31)

Current source

A current source is an electronic circuit that delivers or absorbs an electric current which is independent of the voltage across it. A current source is the dual of a voltage source. The term current sink is sometimes used for sources fed from a negative voltage supply. Figure 1 shows the schematic symbol for an ideal current source driving a resistive load. There are two types. An independent current source (or sink) delivers a constant current. A dependent current source delivers a current which is proportional to some other voltage or current in the circuit.

Voltage source

A voltage source is a two-terminal device which can maintain a fixed voltage. An ideal voltage source can maintain the fixed voltage independent of the load resistance or the output current. However, a real-world voltage source cannot supply unlimited current. A voltage source is the dual of a current source. Real-world sources of electrical energy, such as batteries and generators, can be modeled for analysis purposes as a combination of an ideal voltage source and additional combinations of impedance elements.

Electric current

An electric current is a flow of charged particles, such as electrons or ions, moving through an electrical conductor or space. It is defined as the net rate of flow of electric charge through a surface. The moving particles are called charge carriers, which may be one of several types of particles, depending on the conductor. In electric circuits the charge carriers are often electrons moving through a wire. In semiconductors they can be electrons or holes.

Direct current

Direct current (DC) is one-directional flow of electric charge. An electrochemical cell is a prime example of DC power. Direct current may flow through a conductor such as a wire, but can also flow through semiconductors, insulators, or even through a vacuum as in electron or ion beams. The electric current flows in a constant direction, distinguishing it from alternating current (AC). A term formerly used for this type of current was galvanic current.

Dependent source

In the theory of electrical networks, a dependent source is a voltage source or a current source whose value depends on a voltage or current elsewhere in the network. Dependent sources are useful, for example, in modeling the behavior of amplifiers. A bipolar junction transistor can be modeled as a dependent current source whose magnitude depends on the magnitude of the current fed into its controlling base terminal. An operational amplifier can be described as a voltage source dependent on the differential input voltage between its input terminals.

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