Silicon carbide high temperature integrated circuit wafer R & D analysis

The University of Arkansas recently developed a silicon carbide high-temperature integrated circuit. The circuit chip can still work normally at a high temperature of about 350 ° C, which greatly improves the processor, drive system, controller and other components in power electronic equipment, automotive and aerospace equipment. The performance of digital circuits. The research was supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Silicon carbide wafers containing 1,000 independent circuit units developed by the University of Arkansas

Compared with traditional silicon-based parts, silicon carbide circuit chips are more able to adapt to harsh high-temperature working environments. Professor Alan Mantooth introduced that this new circuit module can improve the performance of signal processing technology, controllers and drive circuits.

According to statistics, about one-third of the total power generation in the United States passes through power electronic converters or motor-driven equipment to achieve power conversion and control before reaching the end user. These devices require parts with extreme temperature resistance and are assembled with integrated modules to reduce the size of the device and save space; the design of silicon carbide integrated circuits not only satisfies these requirements well, but also greatly improves the electrical efficiency of the device .

The SiC circuit chip developed by the University of Arkansas is not only resistant to ultra-high voltage, but also a very good thermal conductor; no additional heat dissipation equipment is required under high-temperature working conditions. Under the leadership of computer engineering professors Mantooth and Jia Di, the R & D team combines the superior performance of SiC with wide temperature design technology. In power electronics and integrated circuits, workers use complementary SiC phase-locked loop (PLL) technology to complete the processing of a series of basic analog signals, digital signals, and mixed-signal modules. The PLL is a control system that generates an output signal, and the phase of the output signal has a certain correlation with the phase of the input signal. This working principle plays a vital role in circuit applications such as signal synchronization, frequency synthesis, and modulation and demodulation.

The research and development of silicon carbide high-temperature integrated circuits at the University of Arkansas is part of the NSF ’s innovative capacity-building program. NSF, through scientific research cooperation with universities and colleges, transforms scientific theories into experimental results and product prototypes, and ultimately promotes them to the market for integration Commercialization of circuit technology.