Publications

Prediction of Pareto-optimal performance improvements in a power conversion system using GaN devices

Zhang, B.; Sudhoff, S.; Pekarek, S.; Swanson, R.; Flicker, Jack D.; Neely, J.; Delhotal, Jarod J.; Kaplar, Robert K.

Gallium Nitride (GaN) semiconductors have extremely low switching loss, high breakdown voltage, and high junction temperature rating. These characteristics enable improved device performance and thus improved switch mode power converter designs. This paper evaluates the Pareto-optimal performance improvements for a DC generation system with predicted GaN loss characteristics and a rigorous multi-objective optimization based design paradigm. The optimization results show that the application of GaN can achieve a 6.4% mass savings relative to Silicon Carbide (SiC) and 40% mass savings relative to Silicon (Si) at the same loss level for a 10 kW application.