High-temperature Characterization of a 1200 V Power Module with 36 mm2 of SiC VJFET Area

Abstract

This is the first high-temperature static and dynamic characterization of a half-bridge power module using 1200 V, 45 mΩ depletion-mode vertical JFETs. With only 36 mm2 of JFET area, the peak pulsed current is measured to be nearly 500 A at room temperature (transistors not saturated), decreasing to 230 A at 250 °C (transistors saturated). Total switching losses are less than 3.2 mJ from 25 °C to 250 °C and show negligible dependence on junction temperature. The achievement of this level of performance with such a small SiC transistor area is important, since die area directly impacts achievable module footprint (system-level power density and cost), device capacitance (switching losses), and semiconductor cost.