holedominated

Holedominated is an adjective used to describe a material or electronic system in which charge transport is primarily carried by holes rather than electrons. In solid-state physics, a hole is the absence of an electron in a full valence band, acting as a positively charged quasiparticle. When a material is doped with acceptor impurities, such as boron in silicon, hole concentration p becomes larger than electron concentration, yielding p-type (hole-dominated) conduction.

In such materials, conductivity is largely determined by the hole mobility μ_h: σ ≈ q p μ_h, with q the elementary charge. The Hall coefficient is typically positive, reflecting hole-dominated transport. Temperature, doping, and scattering affect the balance between holes and electrons; at high intrinsic carrier generation, intrinsic behavior can reduce the dominance of holes.

Common examples include p-type silicon and other semiconductors doped with acceptors. Hole-dominated transport also appears in some organic semiconductors and correlated-electron materials where band structure or interactions favor hole-like carriers.

Holedominated is contrasted with electron-dominated (n-type) transport, where electrons are the majority carriers and govern the conductivity and Hall response.