An improved understanding of IGBT behavior under thermal stress

Two dimensional numerical simulation is carried out to demonstrate the static and dynamic performance of two commercial IGBTs, IRGBC40F for International Rectifier and IXHG40N60A for IXYS and to analyze the forward voltage drops of IGBTs (IR and IXYS) as function of its conception and of temperature. Furthermore, this paper provides detailed analyses of the (dv/dt) capability for (IR and IXYS) IGBTs devices and examination of their response at turn-off with variations in gate resistor, Cd freewheeling diode capacitance and in temperature. At the same time, we try to study and investigate the evolution of electrical properties of IGBT submitted to thermal stress where the influence of temperature during IGBT operation is dominant. Thermal stress technique can be used to simulated and evaluated natural ageing and its resulting parameters degradation of the device when the later found to operate under normal conditions. Our study is then validated by use of two (2D) dimensional modeling tool (Pspice, Spice). The authors hope that this paper can contribute to the understanding the dv/dt capability, to detect impending degradation under thermal stress of commercial IGBT (IR, IXYS) devices operation, show how it relates to some underlying physical mechanisms and achieve high power switching efficiency, reduced cost, improved reliability and reduced parasitic. Comparison between measurements and simulation shows good agreement.