Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge Module

Silicon Carbide MOSFETs have lower switching losses when compared to similarly rated Silicon IGBT, but exhibit faster switching edges, larger overshoots and increased oscillatory switching behaviour, resulting in greater electro-magnetic interference (EMI) generation. Active Gate Drivers (AGD) can h...

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Main Authors: Mason Parker, Ilker Sahin, Ross Mathieson, Stephen Finney, Paul D. Judge
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: IEEE 2023-01-01
Series:IEEE Open Journal of Power Electronics
Subjects:
Online Access:https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10054505/
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author Mason Parker
Ilker Sahin
Ross Mathieson
Stephen Finney
Paul D. Judge
author_facet Mason Parker
Ilker Sahin
Ross Mathieson
Stephen Finney
Paul D. Judge
author_sort Mason Parker
collection DOAJ
description Silicon Carbide MOSFETs have lower switching losses when compared to similarly rated Silicon IGBT, but exhibit faster switching edges, larger overshoots and increased oscillatory switching behaviour, resulting in greater electro-magnetic interference (EMI) generation. Active Gate Drivers (AGD) can help mitigate these issues while maintaining low switching losses. Numerous AGD topologies have been presented with varying capabilities in terms of timing resolution and output stage complexity. This paper presents an experimental investigation into the influence these capabilities have on the switching performance of an AGD driven high current module, with the goal of advising future AGD designers on the performance trade-offs between signal resolution and complexity. A 2.5 ns resolution 6-level AGD was utilised in combination with parameter sweeps and a genetic algorithm to determine gate voltage patterns that provided improved switching performance. Results indicate that higher resolution (2.5–5 ns) provided the greatest improvements in switching performance, even utilising the simplest considered gate driving patterns, with the use of more complex patterns offering minimal additional improvements. However, at lower timing resolutions (10–40 ns) a stronger set-point dependence degradation in switching performance is observed when using simpler gate patterns, which can be mitigated by utilising more complex patterns.
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spelling doaj.art-ce5fe047eb05434fbae6443403ebabc82023-03-13T23:00:59ZengIEEEIEEE Open Journal of Power Electronics2644-13142023-01-01416117510.1109/OJPEL.2023.325008610054505Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge ModuleMason Parker0https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8250-2781Ilker Sahin1https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3085-8828Ross Mathieson2https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0252-2999Stephen Finney3https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9748-7905Paul D. Judge4https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0926-6804Institute of Energy Systems, School of Engineering, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K.Institute of Energy Systems, School of Engineering, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K.Institute of Energy Systems, School of Engineering, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K.Institute of Energy Systems, School of Engineering, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K.Institute of Energy Systems, School of Engineering, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K.Silicon Carbide MOSFETs have lower switching losses when compared to similarly rated Silicon IGBT, but exhibit faster switching edges, larger overshoots and increased oscillatory switching behaviour, resulting in greater electro-magnetic interference (EMI) generation. Active Gate Drivers (AGD) can help mitigate these issues while maintaining low switching losses. Numerous AGD topologies have been presented with varying capabilities in terms of timing resolution and output stage complexity. This paper presents an experimental investigation into the influence these capabilities have on the switching performance of an AGD driven high current module, with the goal of advising future AGD designers on the performance trade-offs between signal resolution and complexity. A 2.5 ns resolution 6-level AGD was utilised in combination with parameter sweeps and a genetic algorithm to determine gate voltage patterns that provided improved switching performance. Results indicate that higher resolution (2.5–5 ns) provided the greatest improvements in switching performance, even utilising the simplest considered gate driving patterns, with the use of more complex patterns offering minimal additional improvements. However, at lower timing resolutions (10–40 ns) a stronger set-point dependence degradation in switching performance is observed when using simpler gate patterns, which can be mitigated by utilising more complex patterns.https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10054505/Active gate drivingAGDSilicon CarbideSiCEMI reductiontiming resolution
spellingShingle Mason Parker
Ilker Sahin
Ross Mathieson
Stephen Finney
Paul D. Judge
Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge Module
IEEE Open Journal of Power Electronics
Active gate driving
AGD
Silicon Carbide
SiC
EMI reduction
timing resolution
title Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge Module
title_full Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge Module
title_fullStr Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge Module
title_full_unstemmed Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge Module
title_short Investigation Into Active Gate-Driving Timing Resolution and Complexity Requirements for a 1200 V 400 A Silicon Carbide Half Bridge Module
title_sort investigation into active gate driving timing resolution and complexity requirements for a 1200 v 400 a silicon carbide half bridge module
topic Active gate driving
AGD
Silicon Carbide
SiC
EMI reduction
timing resolution
url https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10054505/
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AT rossmathieson investigationintoactivegatedrivingtimingresolutionandcomplexityrequirementsfora1200v400asiliconcarbidehalfbridgemodule
AT stephenfinney investigationintoactivegatedrivingtimingresolutionandcomplexityrequirementsfora1200v400asiliconcarbidehalfbridgemodule
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