A dopant is an impurity that is added in small amounts to a pure substance to change its properties.

Examples

• Boron, arsenic, phosphorus, antimony, among other substances, are used as dopants when added to a pure semiconductor material to alter its electrical characteristics.

These dopants determine the ability for a semiconductor to become negativly or positivly chaged. These dopants do this by being applied to a semiconductor in a man-made way through chemical reactions. When an also known as a dopant, is added onto an element this process is called doping.

Valence

P-type crystals are created when a impurity is doped onto a semiconductor. These impurities have three valence electrons. Figuring out how many valence electrons an impurity has can be done by looking at a periodic table.

The word |Group → points to numbers that show how many valence electrons each atom has in its row... well you know what.. sadly i have to stop here because wikipedias.. periodic table of elements isn't setup correctly.. but you get the idea right? Dopants change the atomic structure of a semiconductor by turning it negative or positive through a process called doping. Another name for a dopant is impurity.

• Artificially produced gemstones (such as rubies) sometimes contain a dopant to identify them as such.

Also called: Dope, Doping Agent