IEEE Power Electronics Magazine - September 2019 - 34

the power switches is possible, he
high CMTI capability up to roughly
continued. Level-shift gate drives
200 V/ns. These gate dr ivers, la Without
the
right
gate
provide functional isolation with the
beled EiceDRIVER, are "perfectly
drivers, WBG-based
high-voltage silicon separation that
suited to drive Infineon families of
is well suited for low-power SiC MOSCoolSiC SiC MOSFETs (for example,
FETs will not deliver
FET applications.
IMW120R045M1) and power modules
the desired perforMany variants of the SiC MOS(such as FF11MR12W1M1_B11 and
FETs
in the market require a variety
FF8MR12W2M1_B11). In addition,
mance at high switchof optimized UVLO levels. In addition
for lower-power SiC MOSFET gate
ing frequencies and
to providing multiple UVLO levels in a
drive solutions used for applications
product family, Infineon has upcomsuch as motor drives, Infineon has
power levels.
ing products with adjustable UVLO
readied level-shift driver ICs with
thresholds to address this problem.
the key unique advantages of better
The requirements between the turnnegative voltage immunity, integrated
on and turn-off voltages of SiC MOSFETs can also be large.
bootstrap diodes, and fast current sensing for short circuit
This means that the supply voltage requirements for the
protection," said Bossemeyer.
gate driver IC must be large enough between the positive
SiC MOSFETs require fast short circuit protection of
and negative rails. The turn-off voltage, in particular, must
fewer than 3 µs, strong gate drive for fast dv/dt, and tight
have tight accuracy with some adjustability, which will lead
propagation delay matching times for design robustness.
to more critical power supply designs for SiC MOSFET gate
Infineon gate driver ICs fulfill these requirements plus offer
driver ICs. Infineon already supports supply-wide voltage
additional flexible options, such as a Miller clamp for unirange gate driver ICs, explained Bossemeyer.
polar supply designs, higher supply voltage ratings for bipoFor assessing its gate driver ICs, Infineon offers two
lar supply designs, fast propagation delay times for higher
evaluation boards with EiceDRIVER gate drivers and Coolswitching frequencies, and the highest levels of CMTI
SiC MOSFETs [2]. These include the EVAL-1EDC20H12AHrobustness, explained Bossemeyer.
SIC/1EDI20H12AH-SIC and EVAL-PS-E1BF12-SIC. While
According to Infineon, some key benefits of magthe EVAL-1EDC20H12AH-SIC (Figure 2) uses gate driver
netic isolation include higher CMTI robustness, a small
1EDC20H12AH, certified according to UL 1577, the EVALamount of power transfer capability, higher timing pre1EDI20H12AHSIC uses the 1EDI20H12AH gate driver. All
cision in propagation delay (matching) and protection,
other components and functionalities are the same. Typia higher switching frequency, simpler control input, no
cal application areas for Infineon SiC MOSFETs and gate
aging of transmission, and higher assembly reliability
drives are solar, uninterruptable power systems, and elecdue to fewer chips. Plus, the integrated bootstrap diode
tric vehicle (EV) chargers (off-board). In these applications,
reduces BOM.
the combination of SiC MOSFETs and integrated gate driv"Isolation is required for all power converters containers is enabling higher switching frequency, higher power
ing high-side switches," stated Bossemeyer. He added
density (lower losses), and the simplification of power electhat switch controllability is not limited by the ground
tronic converters (three-level inverters with IGBTs versus
bounce of low-side switches, compared to solutions using
two-level inverters with SiC).
only nonisolated driver ICs. Therefore, a high di/dt of
The company will continue to expand the CoolSiC product portfolio supported by enhanced integrated gate driver
ICs with fast (less than 1 µs) protection functions and userconfigurable settings for critical design parameters.
Like Infineon, Power Integrations (PI) prefers magnetic
isolation. Consequently, PI has integrated proprietary FluxLink technology for reinforced isolation up to 1,200 V. According to PI's senior director of marketing, Michael Hornkamp,
"Without proper isolation and using external boost stage,
efficiently driving SiC MOSFETs may be challenging. Plus, it
adds to the cost and size, including efficiency of the inverter.
With the development of the single-channel SCALE-iDriver
(SIC1182K), PI has eliminated these problems, while enabling
safe, efficient, compact, and cost-effective inverters with
very few external components" (Figure 3).
FIG 2 Infineon's evaluation board features an EiceDRIVER
Housed in an eSOP-R16B package with 9.5-mm creep1EDC20H12AH gate driver IC and a CoolSiC MOSFET
age
and clearance, the SIC1182K provides advanced
IMZ120R045M1. (Source: Infineon Technologies; used with
active clamping and reinforced isolation up to 1,200 V via
permission.)

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