A novel soft and fast recovery diode (SFD) with thin p-layer formed by Al-Si electrode

A novel, soft and fast recovery diode (SFD) is presented which has extremely thin p-layers formed by an Al-Si electrode and deep p/sup +/-layers. By using the thin p-layer, the hole density in the n/sup -/-layer close to the p-n junction is reduced, and a 1/2.5 lower recovery current peak, 1/3 lower recovery current change, and 1.5 times faster recovery time are realized compared to a conventional p-n diode. Moreover, increasing the barrier height of the p-layer causes the leakage current and forward voltage drop to decrease. It is also demonstrated that electrical noise and turn-on loss of an IGBT module in an inverter circuit can be significantly improved by using the SFD as a free wheeling diode.<<ETX>>

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