Design concept and performance considerations for fast high power semiconductor switching for high repetition rate and high power excimer laser

A semiconductor switching power supply has been developed, in which a novel structure semiconductor device, metal-oxide-semiconductor assisted gate-triggered thyristor (MAGT) was incorporated with a single stage magnetic pulse compression circuit (MPC). The MAGT was specially designed to directly replace thyratrons in a power supply for a high repetition rate laser. Compared with conventional high power semiconductor switching devices, it was designed to enable a fast switching, retaining a high blocking voltage and to extremely reduce the transient turn-on power losses, enduring a higher peak current. A maximum peak current density of 32 kA/cm² and a current density risetime rate di/dt of 142 kA/(cm²×μs) were obtained at the chip area with an applied anode voltage of 1.5 kV. A MAGT switching unit connecting 32 MAGTs in series was capable of switching on more than 25 kV–300 A at a repetition rate of 5 kHz, which, coupled with the MPC, was equivalent to the capability of a high power thyratron. A high repetition rate and high power XeCl excimer laser was excited by the power supply. The results confirmed the stable laser operation of a repetition rate of up to 5 kHz, the world record to our knowledge. An average output power of 0.56 kW was obtained at 5 kHz where the shortage of the total discharge current was subjoined by a conventional power supply with seven parallel switching thyratrons, simultaneously working, for the MAGT power supply could not switch a greater current than that switched by one thyratron. It was confirmed by those excitations that the MAGT unit with the MPC could replace a high power commercial thyratron directly for excimer lasers. The switching stability was significantly superior to that of the thyratron in a high repetition rate region, judging from the- discharge current wave forms. It should be possible for the MAGT unit, in the future, to directly switch the discharge current within a rise time of 0.1 μs with a magnetic assist. © 1997 American Institute of Physics.