AND90103/D onsemi M 1 1200 V SiC MOSFETs & Modules: Characteristics and Driving Recommendations

PublishTime：2022-04-22

●ABSTRACT
■SiC MOSFETs are quickly proliferating in the power semiconductor market as some of the initial reliability concerns have been resolved and the price level has reached a very attractive point. As more devices become available in the market, it is important to understand both the commonalities and the differences with IGBTs so that the user can get the most out of each device. This paper provides an overview on the key characteristics of onsemi M 1 1200 V SiC MOSFETs and how they can be influenced by the driving conditions. As part of the full wide bandgap ecosystem that onsemi offers, this article also provides a guideline on the usage of the NCP51705 an isolated gate driver for SiC MOSFETs.
●INTRODUCTION
■Silicon carbide (SiC) is part of the wide bandgap (WBG) family of semiconductor materials used to fabricate discrete power semiconductors. As shown in Table 1, conventional silicon (Si) MOSFETs have a bandgap energy of 1.12 eV compared to SiC MOSFETs possessing 3.26 eV.
■The wider bandgap energy associated with SiC and (GaN) Gallium Nitride means that it takes approximately 3 times the energy to move electrons from their valence band to the conduction band, resulting in a material that behaves more like an insulator and less like a conductor. This allows WBG semiconductors to withstand much higher breakdown voltages, highlighted by their breakdown field robustness being 10 times that of silicon. A higher breakdown field enables a reduction in device thickness for a given voltage rating which translates to lower on−resistance and higher current capability. SiC and GaN each have mobility parameters on the same order of magnitude as silicon, making both materials well suited for high−frequency switching applications. The thermal conductivity of SiC is three times greater than that of silicon and GaN. Higher thermal conductivity translates to lower temperature rise for a given power dissipation.
■The R-DS(ON) for a specific required breakdown voltage considering one part of a MOSFET [1] is inversely proportional to the product of the mobility times the cube of the critical breakdown field. Even if SiC has a lower mobility than silicon, the critical breakdown field is ten times higher, resulting in a much lower R-DS(ON) for a given breakdown voltage.
■The guaranteed maximum operating temperature for commercially available SiC MOSFETs is 150°C < T-J < 200°C. Comparatively, SiC junction temperatures as high as 600°C are attainable but mostly limited by bonding and packaging techniques. This makes SiC the superior WBG semiconductor material for high−voltage, high−speed, high−current, high−temperature, switching power applications.
■SiC MOSFETs are commonly available in the range of 650 V < BVDSS < 1.7 kV. Although the dynamic switching behavior of SiC MOSFETs is quite similar to standard silicon MOSFETs, there are unique gate drive requirements dictated by their device characteristics that must be taken into consideration.

Brand of Product：	ON Semiconductor
Part#：	AND90103 More Part#
Product Category：	SiC MOSFETs More
Application：	More
Data Type：	Application note & Design Guide More
Safety & Environment Standards：	More
Operating Temperature：	Please see the document for details
Qualification Grade：	More
Qualification Approval：	More
Package：
Language：	English Chinese Chinese and English Japanese
Date of Creation：	April, 2022
Version Number：	Rev. 2
Data Encoding：	AND90103/D
Data Size：	3.6 MB

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