Recent review on failures in silicon carbide power MOSFETs

Abstract

In every new technology, the understanding of its failure mechanism is essential to ensure reliability. In this paper an overview on some state-of-the-art characterization methods of 4H-SiC metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs) are presented. Silicon-based devices employ many different tools for the study of failure mechanism, which can be exploited for silicon carbide (SiC) devices. Silicon carbide semiconductor offers very interesting electrical and thermal properties for power electronics application in comparison to Si but exhibits different failure mechanisms that need to be studied. Silicon carbide MOSFETs allow for a better energy conversion efficiency in comparison to silicon-based devices, with potential applications in electric vehicles and microgrids converters. Silicon carbide technology can greatly improve on electrical energy management and so failure mechanism studies will lead to the production of robust and high performance devices.