Design and experimental validation of a high frequency gate driver for silicon carbide power modules

This paper presents the design, development and validation process of a high frequency Gate Driver for Silicon Carbide (SiC) Power Modules. The Gate Driver includes isolation and voltage adaptation functionalities as well as main protection functions (voltage clamp, over current and short-circuit). It has been designed following a modular approach, with a Base Driver (which depends on the electrical and mechanical features of the selected Power Module) and a Core Driver (which can be used with any module of the same voltage isolation requirements). The Gate Driver has been integrated and tested in two different SiC converters (both of them based on the CAS100H12AM1 module 1200V, 100A): a three-phase 50 kVA-100kHz inverter and a DC-DC interleaved 100kW-60kHz converter.