Date: 18/02/2009

Silicon carbide schottky diodes for power conversion systems

Infineon Technologies introduced new family of SiC Schottky diodes. Featuring the low device capacitance for any given current rating, which enhances overall system efficiency at higher switching frequencies and under light load conditions, the new thinQ Diodes help reduce overall power converter system costs.
Main application areas for SiC Schottky diodes are active Power Factor Correction (CCM PFC) in Switched-Mode Power Supplies (SMPS) and other AC/DC and DC/DC power conversion applications such as solar inverters and motor drives.

Compared to the previous family, the device capacitances of these 3G SiC Schottky diodes are about 40 percent lower, which reduces switching losses. For example in a 1 kW PFC stage operating at 250 kHz there will be an improvement of 0.4 percent in the overall efficiency under 20 percent load conditions. Higher switching frequencies allow the use of smaller and lower cost passive components. Reduced power losses result in reduced cooling requirements in terms of size and number of heat-sinks and fans. This also contributes to reduced system level energy requirements to provide an appropriate cooling environment.

Package:
1. Diodes with 600V (3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, and 12 A), is available in both TO-220 and DPAK packages
2. Diodes with 1200V (2, 5, 8, 10, and 15 A) is available in TO-220 package

Availability:
1. Sampling started in January 2009
2. Series production is scheduled in early spring 2009

Price: (In quantities of 10K pieces, for diodes with a blocking voltage of 600V)
1. The 3A version is priced at Euro 0.61 (US $ 0.85,) per unit
2. The 4A version is priced at Euro 0.85 (US $ 1.19) per unit
3. The 8A version is priced at Euro 1.89 (US $ 2.65) per unit

Further information on Infineon is available at www.infineon.com/sic