Comparison of bipolar and unipolar ionic diodes

Nanoporous ionic diodes, as well as devices for manipulating ions and molecules in a solution, have attracted a great deal of interest from researchers in various fields from the fundamental point of view. Ionic diodes allow the ions to be transported in one direction and block the transport in the other. There are two types of diodes that have been realized experimentally. A bipolar diode contains a junction between two zones of the pore walls with positive and negative surface charges. A unipolar diode contains a zone that is neutral and a zone that is charged. In this paper we discuss differences in operation of the diodes with a special emphasis on the sensitivity of their performance to the lengths of the charged and neutral zones. We also show that a bipolar diode offers more asymmetric current-voltage curves than a unipolar diode.