4.1 State-of-the-Art SiC Devices

SiC electronic devices can be broadly classified into two categories: Semi-conducting- and semi-insulating-based devices. The semi-conducting SiC power devices can also be categorized into power rectifiers and power switches, while semi-insulating-based devices comprise high power high frequency application devices as shown in Fig. 4.1.

It should be noted that many types of SiC power devices are still in the prototype demonstration phase while others have demonstrated performance measures far superior to silicon. These include the PiN (positive-intrinsic-negative) diodes, the Schottky barrier diode (SBD), the merged PiN Schottky diode (MPS) operate with blocking voltages above 12 kV [168], the metal-oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) [169], the junction field-effect transistor (JFET), the bipolar junction transistor (BJT) [170] with performance figures 100 times higher than in silicon, the gate turn-off thyristor (GTO) blocking over 3 kV and switching over 60 kW [171], the metal-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MESFET) and the static induction transistor (SIT) which show ultrahigh frequency, power density and an associated power added efficiency (PAE) of 78% [172,16].

Figure 4.1: Summary of the numerous electronic device applications for both semi-conducting and semi-insulating SiC material.

T. Ayalew: SiC Semiconductor Devices Technology, Modeling, and Simulation