Electrical and electrothermal 2D simulations of a 4H-SiC high voltage current limiting device for serial protection applications

Abstract

The subject of this paper is a study of the ability of silicon carbide to be used for new solid state power device applications. A 4H-SiC current limiting device is studied. The device structure is a vertical power MOSFET with a preformed N channel. Its electrothermal behavior is presented through simulations with ISE TCAD tools. The efficiency of such a silicon device is estimated for comparison with SiC. A full simulation with two SiC devices inside an HSPICE modeled circuit is also proposed to study the ability of a bi-directional serial protection system.