Fisher, Craig A., Jennings, M. R., Sharma, Yogesh K., Hamilton, Dean P., Li, Fan, Gammon, P. M., Pérez-Tomás, Amador, Thomas, Stephen M., Burrows, S. E. (Susan E.) and Mawby, P. A. (Philip A.) (2014) On the application of novel high temperature oxidation processes to enhance the performance of high voltage silicon carbide PiN diodes. In: 2014 16th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications (EPE'14-ECCE Europe), , Finland, 26-28 Aug 2014. Published in: 2014 16th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications (EPE'14-ECCE Europe), pp. 1-9. doi:10.1109/EPE.2014.6910738

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Abstract

In this paper, the application of a combined high temperature (1550°C) thermal oxidation / annealing process has been applied to 4H-SiC PiN diodes with 110 μm thick n-type drift regions, for the purpose of increasing the carrier lifetime in the semiconductor. PiN diodes were fabricated on lifetime-enhanced 4H-SiC material, then were electrically characterised and compared against fabricated control sample PiN diodes. Forward current-voltage (I-V) measurements showed that the lifetime-enhanced devices typically had around 15% lower forward voltage drop and 40% lower differential on-resistance (at 100 A/cm2 and 25°C) when compared against control sample PiN diodes. Reverse I-V measurements indicated that the reverse leakage current was strongly dependent on the active area, and hence perimeter-to-area ratio, of the fabricated devices, though large-area PiN diodes were measured to have a reverse leakage current density of around 1 nA/cm2 (at 100 V reverse bias). Analysis of reverse recovery characteristics illustrated the excellent transient characteristics of both types of fabricated device, though, as expected from the increased carrier lifetime, the lifetime-enhanced PiN diodes had around 22% higher reverse recovery charge. The minority carrier lifetime was also extracted from reverse recovery characteristics; PiN diodes fabricated on the lifetime-enhanced 4H-SiC material were found to have a carrier lifetime over 35% higher than the control sample devices. Analysis of the overall power losses of both types of device found that the lifetime-enhanced PiN diodes typically dissipated around 40% less energy over the complete switching cycle than the control sample PiN diodes at 25°C.

Item Type:	Conference Item (Poster)
Subjects:	Q Science > QC Physics
Divisions:	Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine > Engineering > Engineering
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Silicon carbide -- Electric properties, Semiconductors, PIN diodes
Journal or Publication Title:	2014 16th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications (EPE'14-ECCE Europe),
Publisher:	IEEE
Official Date:	August 2014
Dates:	Date Event August 2014 UNSPECIFIED
Page Range:	pp. 1-9
DOI:	10.1109/EPE.2014.6910738
Status:	Peer Reviewed
Publication Status:	Published
Date of first compliant deposit:	31 March 2016
Date of first compliant Open Access:	1 April 2016
Funder:	Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), Advantage West Midlands (AWM), European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), Birmingham Science City
Grant number:	EP/I013636/1 (EPSRC), EP/K035304/1 (EPSRC)
Conference Paper Type:	Poster
Title of Event:	2014 16th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications (EPE'14-ECCE Europe),
Type of Event:	Conference
Location of Event:	Finland
Date(s) of Event:	26-28 Aug 2014

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