News: Suppliers
4 May 2021
Keysight adds customized GaN test board for PD1500A dynamic power device analyzer/double-pulse tester
Keysight Technologies Inc of Santa Rosa, CA, USA has announced a customized gallium nitride (GaN) test board for its dynamic power device analyzer/double-pulse tester (PD1500A), enabling tier-one and OEM power converter designers to reduce prototype cycles and speed the introduction of new products.
Power converters are a key component for enabling the electrification of the transportation, renewable energy and industrial markets. For e-Mobility, the main application of the power converter (i.e. traction inverter) is to efficiently convert the power stored in the high-voltage battery pack of an electronic vehicle (EV) to drive the AC motor. There are many other applications for the power converter in EVs, including the on-board charger, which is the key link for vehicle-to-grid applications.
To facilitate advances in power converter design, new wide-bandgap (WBG) semiconductor technologies are being commercialized, providing improvements in speed, voltage and thermal operation. This, in turn, improves efficiency, while decreasing size and reducing cost. However, the resulting high-performance power converters are proving difficult to design.
To deliver consistent, reliable characterization of WBG semiconductors, Keysight developed the PD1500A dynamic power device analyzer platform. The PD1500A is modular, allowing discrete silicon- and silicon carbide (SiC)-based power devices to be characterized. Now, with a customized GaN test board, the PD1500A delivers repeatable and reliable characterization for faster switching devices.
GaN is currently only targeting on-board chargers and DC-DC converters in EVs. However, with the advent of vertical GaN, expectations are that operating voltages will catch up with SiC (1.2kV and higher), making GaN a potential choice for higher-power applications in e-Mobility.
Keysight’s measurement science enables a commercially available solution for repeatable and reliable characterization of GaN power devices, accelerating the ability of OEM and tier-one providers to introduce competitive EV technology to the market.
