Low consumption and high frequency GaN-based gate driver circuit with integrated PWM

A gallium nitride (GaN)-based gate driver circuit for high power and high speed GaN power switches is presented. The principle of the proposed circuit is based upon two normally-on GaN HEMTs and a self-biasing resistance. An integrated pulse width modulation functionality has been implemented using the threshold effect of the presented topology. The gate driver has been built with two CGHV1F006S GaN HEMT devices from Cree, Inc. It has been connected to the gate port of a 45 W CGH40045F GaN power switch operating as a DC/DC boost converter for the purpose of demonstration. Low consumption (≈1 W) and high frequency switching operation up to 60 MHz over the 20-80% duty cycle range is demonstrated. The square waveforms having switching times in the order of nanoseconds have been measured.