Vishay introduces new 3rd generation 650 V SiC Schottky diodes

     Vishay Intertechnology announced the launch of 17 new third-generation 650 V silicon carbide (SiC) Schottky diodes. The Vishay Semiconductors are designed with a hybrid PIN Schottky (MPS) architecture with high surge current protection and low forward voltage drop, capacitive charge and reverse leakage current, helping to improve the energy efficiency and reliability of switching power supply designs.

     The new generation of SiC diodes includes 4A TO 40A devices in TO-22OAC 2L and TO-247AD 3L plug-in packages and D2PAK 2L (TO-263AB 2L) surface mount packages. Due to the MPS structure, the device's forward voltage drop is 0.3V lower than the previous generation solution, and the forward voltage drop is the product of the capacitive charge, the power energy efficiency important value factor (FOM), is 17% lower than the previous generation solution.

     Typical reverse leakage current of the diode is 30% lower at room temperature and 70% lower at high temperatures compared to close competing solutions. This reduces on-off losses and ensures high energy efficiency during light and no-load periods. Unlike ultrafast recovery diodes, third-generation devices have little to no recovery trailing, enabling further efficiency gains.

     Compared with silicon diodes with similar breakdown voltage, SiC diodes have high thermal conductivity, low reverse current and short reverse recovery time. The diode reverse recovery time is almost unaffected by temperature changes and can operate at +175 °C without energy efficiency changes due to switching losses.

     Typical device applications include AC/DC power factor correction (PFC) and DC/DC UHF output rectification in FBPS and LLC converters for power generation and exploration applications. The device is highly reliable, RoHS compliant, halogen-free, and has passed 2,000 hours of high temperature reverse bias (HTRB) testing and 2,000 thermal cycle temperature cycles, which is twice the test time and number of cycles specified in AEC-Q101.