Experimentally demonstrate a cathode short MOS-controlled thyristor (CS-MCT) for single or repetitive pulse applications

In this paper, a cathode-short MOS-controlled thyristor (CS-MCT) is proposed and fabricated for pulse power application. The CS-MCT is distinguished from conventional MCT (CON-MCT) with a cathode-short structure, which forms an extracting path for hole current at gate-ground (Vg=0 V) and brings about a normally-off characteristic. During the conduction of current in the on-state, the PNPN structure of proposed CS-MCT provides a regeneration action bringing about an ultralow on-resistance. The experiment results show the proposed CS-MCT exhibits a breakdown voltage of more than 1600 V at Vg=0, a peak current (Ipeak) of 2.4 kA and current rise rate (di/dt) of 12.5 kA/μs at a single shot, compared with 600 V, 2.2 kA and 11.8 kA/μs for CON-MCT, respectively. In addition, a favorable continuous pulse waveform is presented at frequency repetition of 10 Hz indicating the proposed CS-MCT is suitable for repetitive pulse application. The superior pulse performances and normally-off characteristic experimentally demonstrated make it promising for CS-MCT to be an alternative to CON-MCT in single or repetitive pulse applications.