'Digital Twin' of ROHM Reference Design Enables 'What if...' Design Space Exploration.
Demand for SMPS is driven by the need for greater efficiency, increased power density and lower cost. Fast, low-loss switches made from silicon carbide (SiC) and related materials will power future applications due to the high performance and efficiency they enable. However, unwanted side effects from high-speed switching include voltage spikes ('ringing'). In addition, it is more difficult to meet conducted and radiated electromagnetic interference (EMI) specifications in higher speed designs. Pre-compliance analysis of a 'virtual prototype' or 'digital twin' is ideal for managing this challenge, but previously required expertise to build and use the necessary design information, called a 'workspace.'
To address this, Keysight teamed with ROHM to create the 'twin' of ROHM's reference design (model P01SCT2080KE-EVK-001) available to mutual customers via Keysight's web site at https://www.keysight.com/us/en/assets/3120-1476/application-notes/Virtual-Reference-Design.pdf.
Virtual prototypes are complementary to physical prototypes. Physical prototypes are the gold standard for compliance and measured characteristics, but have several drawbacks including: expensive and time consuming to design, build and measure; are vulnerable to catastrophic failure (the infamous 'smoke test' that produces actual smoke); and it is hard to get a measurement probe onto interior nodes.
In contrast, virtual prototypes are easy to change and while they do flag device overstress as warning messages during simulation, they never emit real smoke. The voltage, current and fields at every spatial point in the 3D grid and every time step in the simulation can be recorded and made accessible for plotting, even points that are physically inaccessible in the real world such as inside a semiconductor package.
'Many of our customers struggle to deal with layout effects when current slew rate in the switched loop exceeds 1A/ns because even tiny parasitic inductances cause ringing. Suppressing EMI is also a big challenge for them,' said
'This is going to be a big timesaver for anyone wanting to get the most out of designs that use wide bandgap power devices. The layouts can be hard to tame, and EM extraction is key. This workspace and application-specific tool like
'SMPS engineers tell me they are all struggling with is designing in this the high di/dt era,' said
About Keysight's
Keysight's power electronics design solutions enable power device production across the entire workflow from simulation, design, and verification to manufacturing, deployment, and optimization. Keysight offers a complete electromagnetic circuit co-simulation environment with its PathWave Advanced Design System.
Additional information about Keysight's
http://www.keysight.com/find/eesof-power-electronics
https://www.keysight.com/us/en/products/software/pathwave-design-software/pathwave-advanced-design-system/pathwave-ads-power-electronics.html
About
About ROHM Semiconductor
As a pioneer and leading supplier, ROHM offers among the industry's largest lineup of SiC power devices for a broad range of applications and industries. From discrete components such as SBDs and MOSFETs that provide breakthrough performance to power modules incorporating multiple SiC devices, ROHM provides products and solutions to suit a variety of needs. More information is available at:
www.rohm.com. Additional information about the physical eval board is available at https://www.rohm.com/power-device-support.
# # #
Additional information about
Keysight Contact:
+1 303 662-4748
geri_lacombe@keysight.com
+81 42 660-2162
fusako_dohi@keysight.com
ROHM Contact:
+1 408 737-6259
jpontious@rohmsemiconductor.com
(C) 2020 Electronic News Publishing, source