An Intelligent Model-Based Multi-Level Active Gate Driver for Power Semiconductor Devices

Silicon carbide (SiC) devices have the benefit of low energy losses and high operation temperature. The fast switching speed of SiC may result in serious electromagnetic interference (EMI) noise, overshoot voltage, and even false triggering. To address these issues, an intelligent cascaded multi-level active gate driver (AGD) topology is proposed to control the switching trajectory of the power device dynamically. It can flexibly adjust the switching speed by either speeding up or slowing down. Its slow turn-off mode has the advantage of short turn-off delay compared with a two-stage turn-off. The circuit has the benefits of simple-realization and cost-effectiveness. Also, a switching behavior trajectory-based model predictive control (MPC) strategy is introduced for this gate driver circuitry. The MPC strategy balances the switching energy losses, EMI noise, and switching process duration. The experimental results reveal that the proposed intelligent AGD can provide desirable performance for controlling the slew rate of the semiconductor device