A segmented gate driver IC for the reduction of IGBT collector current over-shoot at turn-on

In this paper, a segmented IGBT gate driver IC for mitigating IGBT turn-on I_C over-shoot is presented. The proposed IC is fabricated using TSMC´s 0.18 μm BCD Gen-2 process. Unlike existing I_C over-shoot reduction techniques, the proposed technique does not require significant additional external components or an increase in turn-on energy. During turn-on, the gate driver is controlled such that (dV_GE/dt) is kept low as current is transferred from the FWD to the IGBT and kept high at all other times. The ideal timing of (dV_GE/dt) transitions could vary between IGBT devices, age, temperature, etc. A feedback system is used to correct for these variances. A 37% reduction in I_C overshoot is achieved while maintaining the same E_ON. A 54% reduction in E_ON is achieved for the same I_C overshoot. Finally, a 15.5 dBm reduction in CEMI is observed when compared to operation with a constant R_OUT and similar Eon.