SiC MOSFET with built-in SBD for reduction of reverse recovery charge and switching loss in 10-kV applications

A silicon carbide (SiC) metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) for 10-kV application is proposed in this paper, which features a built-in Schottky barrier diode (SBD). Therefore, the body diode is free from activation during the third quadrant conduction state, which is beneficial for reducing the switching loss and suppressing bipolar degradation. Numerical simulations with Sentaurus TCAD are carried out to investigate the characteristics of the proposed structure in comparison to the conventional MOSFET and SBD pair. It is found that the proposed structure achieves lower reverse recovery charge and switching loss owing to three factors, i.e., faster switching speed, smaller capacitive charge, and body diode deactivation, and therefore is a superior choice for 10-kV applications.