A novel electrothermal IGBT modeling approach for circuit simulation design

This paper describes a novel electrothermal coupling simulation model for analyzing IGBT power devices for large scale applications. The model calculates the conduction and switching losses in a wide range of operation points and returns an accurate temperature prediction. The electrical and thermal model parameters are extracted from the manufacturer catalog datasheet values. The new model device on-voltage characteristics show good agreement with measured results. The thermal model can take into account lateral heat spreading within the module and thermal interference among power devices. The features of the present model are described and compared against the simulation results of a half-bridge circuit and three phase inverter topology.