Abstract
Owing to the superior properties of silicon carbide (SiC), such as higher breakdown voltage, higher thermal conductivity, higher operating frequency, higher operating temperature, and higher saturation drift velocity, SiC has attracted much attention from researchers and the industry for decades. With the advances in material science and processing technology, many power applications such as new smart energy vehicles, power converters, inverters, and power supplies are being realized using SiC power devices. In particular, SiC MOSFETs are generally chosen to be used as a power device due to their ability to achieve lower on-resistance, reduced switching losses, and high switching speeds than the silicon counterpart and have been commercialized extensively in recent years. A general review of the critical processing steps for manufacturing SiC MOSFETs, types of SiC MOSFETs, and power applications based on SiC power devices are covered in this paper. Additionally, the reliability issues of SiC power MOSFET are also briefly summarized.
Highlights
The development of power electronics technology has always been towards achieving higher power density, higher efficiency, and integrating many systems [1,2]
gallium nitride (GaN)-based devices are mainly used for high-frequency applications, while silicon carbide (SiC)-based devices are used for high voltage power applications
The major advantage of SiC MOSFET over Si MOSFET is that as the temperature rises from 25 to 135 ◦C, the on-resistance of SiC MOSFET is increased by 20%, whereas it increased by 250% for Si MOSFET [37]
Summary
The development of power electronics technology has always been towards achieving higher power density, higher efficiency, and integrating many systems [1,2]. The introduction of wide-bandgap (WBG) semiconductor materials such as silicon carbide (SiC) and gallium nitride (GaN) materials have been a revolutionary development in the field of power devices [3,4]. GaN-based devices are mainly used for high-frequency applications, while SiC-based devices are used for high voltage power applications. The larger critical electric field, higher thermal conductivity, and higher breakdown voltage enable SiC-based devices to operate at higher current density, higher temperature, and higher blocking voltage [4,6,7,8]. SiC-based power components have been a topic for extensive research for high voltage/power applications for more than a decade. The material cost of SiC is much lesser than that of GaN [12], and the processing lines of SiC-based devices have great compatibility with that of Si-based devices
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