Isolated gate drivers effectively drive IGBTs and SiC power FETs

Texas Instruments UCC23313 Isolated Gate Drivers are created for IGBTs, MOSFETs and SiC MOSFETs, with 4.5A source, a 5.3A sink peak output current, and a 3.75kVRMS basic isolation rating. The driver has a high supply voltage range of 33V and enables the employment of bipolar supplies to effectively drive IGBTs and SiC power FETs. The device can drive both low side and high side power FETs.

The driver provides key features and characteristics that deliver significant performance and reliability upgrades over standard optocoupler based gate drivers while sustaining pin-to-pin compatibility in both schematic and layout design. Performance highlights comprise high common-mode transient immunity, low propagation delay, and small pulse width distortion. This tight process control produces a small part-to-part skew. The input stage is an emulated diode (ediode) which indicates long term reliability and enhanced ageing characteristics in comparison to traditional LEDs.

The isolated gate drivers are excellent for employment in all types of motor drives, solar inverters, industrial power supplies, and appliances. The higher operating temperature of –40C to +150C opens up possibilities for applications not previously capable of being supported by traditional optocouplers.