Design criteria for high frequency, ultra high di/dt MAGTs

2500-V MOS assisted gate triggered thyristors (MAGTs) have been proposed as promising devices for future pulsed power applications. It was successfully demonstrated that the device has extremely high turn-on capability, comparable to thyratrons. The MAGT high-frequency operation design criteria are shown here. The photoluminescence (PL) decay method was used to measure the actual carrier lifetime in MAGT devices. It reveals that an electron carrier lifetime more than half of the operating pulse width is sufficient to minimize the turn-on loss. This means that the pause period can be reduced while still retaining small turn-on loss. A simple model is presented to interpret the turn-on loss dependence on the N-base width. With the optimized devices, 5-kHz operation was successfully demonstrated.<>