Question

What is a conduction band?

Answer 1

The conduction band is the band where electrons operate. The electrons in their excited state jump from valence band to conduction band.

Complete step by step answer:
-The energy disparity between the valence band’s highest occupied energy state and conduction band’s lowest unoccupied state is called the band gap and is representative of a material’s electrical conductivity. A wide band gap means a lot of energy is needed to excite valence electrons to the conduction band.
-On the other hand, electrons will quickly jump between the two bands where the valence band and conduction band overlap as they do in metals indicating the substance is extremely conductive.For electrons inside the substance, a good way to imagine the difference between conductors, insulators and semiconductors is to map their energies. The energy states that are available form bands instead of having separate energies, as in case of free atoms.
-The electrons within the valence band are separated by a wide distance from the conduction band in insulators, the valence band overlaps the conduction band in conductors such as metals, and there is very small enough difference between the valence and conduction bands in semiconductors that can cross between the valence and conduction bands in semiconductors that can cross the distance by thermal or entirely different excitations.
-Insulators are distinguished by a large band gap, since it takes a prohibitively large amount of energy to transfer electrons to form a current in the conduction band. Conductors have an overlap between the conduction and valence bands, so the valence electrons are effectively free in such conductors. On the other hand, semiconductors have a limited band gap that allows for a substantial fractional gap.

Note: If the gap between valence band and conduction band is less than electrons can jump more quickly and the conduction band conducts efficiently.Mainly,the conductivity of an element depends on the energy band gap and this energy band gap responsible for classification of various elements as an conductor,insulator and semiconductor.