High-temperature switching and evaluation of 4H-SiC gate turn-off thyristors and diodes under inductive loads

Future U.S Army electric motor control applications will require power semiconductor devices that operate for thousands of hours at case temperatures of 150°C and higher. For reliable operation of silicon (Si)-based power electronics, the case temperature must be below 120°C. Because of this temperature limitation of Si, new wide bandgap materials, such as silicon carbide (SiC) are being investigated. We report on a SiC gate turn-off thyristor (GTO) and SiC p-i-n diode operating at case temperatures up to 150°C. For high power and high voltage applications the GTO is the switch of choice. In this study, currents up to 2 A where switched by the GTO under pulsed and continuous switching into an inductive load. The turn-on and turn-off gains, the on-state voltage, and the turn-on and turn-off times, as a function of temperature will be discussed.