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by M. Melito
ABSTRACT
IGBTs are used in a variety of switching very fast. However they must have very low
applications thanks to their attractive V CE(sat), and be very rugged. Existing
characteristics, particularly their peak current technology allows a compromise between
capability, ruggedness and simple gate drive switching speed, ruggedness and power
requirements. Until recently their use was dissipation.
limited to the electrical drive sector, where This paper gives a brief explanation of the
they were required to be fast like Power physics and structure of the device, and
MOSFETs and to have low conduction highlights the characteristics which make
losses like BJTs. IGBTs particularly suitable as power switches
As automotive ignition switches operate at in automotive ignition systems.
low frequencies, they are not required to be
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APPLICATION NOTE
voltage and current levels simultaneously, release in the generation of the spark. All of
without damage or degradation of reliability. the stored electromagnetic energy tends to
This can be achieved only if the voltage and conc entrat e across c ircuit parasitic
current levels are within the boundaries of capacitances, charging them to high voltages
the guaranteed turn-off (Reverse Bias) Safe and putting the device in avalanche, with a
Operating Area (RBSOA); otherwise an aid risk of going into second breakdown and
network is required to shape the voltage failing. This problem is overcome by
and current waveforms. Current technology dissipating this energy on the power switch
allows the production of IGBTs with a square through a protection Zener placed between
RBSOA whose voltage boundary is the the collector and the base of the device,
BVCES, and whose current limit is at least which turns the device on as soon as the
twice the nominal current of the device; thus collector voltage exceeds the nominal Zener
an aid network is not needed. voltage (fig. 4a,4b). The usual way to indicate
b) In the case of disconnection of a spark the minimum energy the switch can absorb
plug, the ignition switch must be able to without damage is to specify the battery
absorb the energy that the coil is unable to voltage, the coil inductance and coil current,
the clamp voltage for the Zener and, if The worst case Icoil will also be specified,
present, the collector-to-emitter capacitance. and Lcoil at its maximum possible value:
With a reasonable margin for the current, Icoil = 8A
e.g. 8A, the switch must survive the switch-
off without load on the coil secondary side. Lcoil = 7mH
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This kind of specification is usually referred extremes of -40oC and 150oC due to the
to as the use test and it can be easily temperature inc rease caus ed by the
guaranteed for IGBTs . electrical power dissipated in the device itself.
1.3.4 Input characteristics The power dissipation of an ignition switch
The ignition switch must be specified to in a high energy ignition system reaches a
ensure that the current and voltage available maximum during the current limiting interval,
from the driving stage are enough to switch fig.5a, apart from a short, very high peak at
it on and off under all temperature conditions. the end of it due to the switch-off phase,
The input characteristics of IGBTs are similar fig.5b, and since the device is used in the
to that of a MOS, and they need a very linear mode the lower VCE(sat) has little
small amount of energy for switching; a influence in power dissipation. The junction
driving energy that is at least two orders of temperature must be kept below its
magnitude less than that needed by maximum allowable value by a heatsink
Darlingtons. Moreover, logic level IGBTs, whose thermal resistance must be calculated
such as the STGP10N50L, can be turned considering :
on with a gate voltage of as little as 3V. - the maximum ambient (under-hood)
1.3. 5 Temperat ure range and power temperature,
dissipation - the max imum thermal resistance,
The electronic components in an automotive junction to case, of the switch
environment are expected to work in the so - the thermal resistance, case to heatsink,
called automotive under-hood temperature due to the contact.
range, -40oC to 100oC. The final criterion cannot be ignored, as in
However it is preferable to specify the critical some cases it can be comparable with the
parameters not only at room temperature, thermal resistance of the device itself.
but also at the junction temperat ure
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2. IGBT TECHN OLOGY AND The switching speed of the IGBT is in general
CHARACTERISTICS not as fast as a Power MOSFET, but this is
2.1 Structure not a limiting factor in this case because of
the very low switching frequencies used in
Except for the p+ substrate, the silicon cross automotive ignition.
section of an IGBT (fig.6) is virtually identical
to that of a standard Power MOSFET. Both Due to the sandwiched layers of the device,
devices have the same cellular design with the area with the extra p+ layer forms a pnp
p-/p+ body, n+ source and polysilicon gate bipolar transistor which defines the fall time
structure. In both devices the n- material of the IGBT. During turn-off the BJT portion
under the p bodies is sized in thickness and has an open base, and switching only
resistivity to sustain the full voltage rating of terminates when all the excess minority
the device. carriers within the base recombine. In a
BJT, it is possible to increase the switching
speed by extracting these carriers from the
Figure 6: Basic structure of an IGBT base, but with an IGBT it is not possible to
access the base of the bipolar section.
Consequently the turn-off is dominated by
the lifetime of the minority carriers in the n-
region.
In order to improve the fall time in IGBTs,
techniques such as electron beam irradiation
and doping with lifetime killers have been
used to control the lifetime of minority
carriers. Structural design changes, such
as the insertion of a n+ buffer layer have
also been introduced (fig.6). The optimization
of these techniques in IGBTs has allowed
tfall and VCE(sat) tuning (fig.7) thus allowing
the best compromise between switching
speed, power losses and ruggedness over
a wide range of applications.
Although their structures are similar, the Figure 7: VCE(sat) versus tfall
physical operation of the IGBT is very
different from that of the Power MOSFET;
the IGBT is a minority carrier device, and its
behaviour is closer to that of bipolar
transistor. This is due to the p+ substrate
which, during conduction, injects holes in
the n- region, significantly reducing its
resistivity.
Because of the conductivity modulation, an
IGBT has lower power losses than a Power
MOSFET, and has a better efficiency than a
bipolar transistor because the emitter covers
the entire area of the die.
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