A modified equivalent circuit based electro-thermal model for integrated POL power modules

Abstract

This paper presents an improved thermal equivalent circuit model which provides an accurate thermal and loss estimation for integrated power modules. Thermal analysis is a critical issue for power electronic systems, it estimates the thermal performance of power devices and enables a flexible converter design. Unlike the conventional thermal models, the modified analytical thermal model takes the temperature dependency of loss into account and achieves a more realistic electro-thermal prediction. The thermal and loss analysis is the interaction of temperature and loss thus its accuracy is significantly improved. Finite element analysis (FEA) and experiment were performed to validate the modified thermal equivalent circuit model and the estimation shows a good agreement with the verifications.