Electronic Development and Testing
The research field Driver Development deals with the design, simulation, realization and testing of gate drivers for controlling semiconductor power transistors. In addition to the development of the driver as such, this includes the implementation of additional circuits for short-circuit detection, clamping, failure shutdown and measurement of different sizes.
The driver is the link between the engineer and the device to be controlled and must be designed to meet a wide range of requirements:
- Stable gate voltage supply
- Ground loop free and potential separated supply and control
- EMC-compatible arrangement and selection of devices
- Detection and handling of failure cases during the experiment
- Design according to the available device connections
- Consideration of measuring points as close to the device and independent as possible
- Estimation of the necessary speed of analog (failure) routines
At the chair gate drivers are used to enable dynamic measurements of transient processes and to increase or guarantee the dynamic robustness of the device and the test bench. Especially the investigation of the switching behaviour of power transistors and their properties when overload situations like short circuit current, surge current or avalanche events occur, pose new challenges for the design.
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