STTR Phase II: Integrated Gallium Nitride (GaN) Field Effect Transistor (FET)-Based High Density On Board Electric Vehichle (EV) Charger

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The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Technology Transfer Phase II project is to improve energy efficiency of power electronics systems through the use of Gallium Nitride (GaN). Power electronics are ubiquitous in today’s society – used inside the electric vehicles, laptops, and data centers. A high-power GaN half-bridge (HPGHB) integrated circuit, a generic building block of the power-electronic systems, will be developed and manufactured. This project seels to demonstrate use of HPGHB in an on-board charger (OBC) applications. The use of HPGHB may lead to smaller and more efficient OBCs. On the educational front, this project will help train graduate students at the University to use GaN for power electronics which is a high demand employment area. Companies will be able to recruit and benefit from this training of graduate students. This Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase II project seeks to develop a robust, high current high-power GaN half-bridge (HPGHB) and a reference design for an on-board charger (OBC). High-current integrated GaN half bridge is challenging due to the need for short-circuit protection and thermal management. HPGHB is planned for areas where long-term reliability is important, such as in automotive/electric vehicle (EV) applications. This STTR project seeks to complete the design of HPGHB increasing its reliability in demanding applications including EVs. Development of an OBC with high efficiency and high-power density may accelerate the adoption of EV. Key challenges for this project are: a) providing protection against short circuiting that causes catastrophic damage; b) demonstrating high efficiency to reduce cooling requirements and reduce size and weight; c) designing novel converter control techniques to enable usage of relatively low cost GaN-on-silicon technology; d) establishing good long-term reliability for the automotive/EV market via dynamic high-temperature-operating-life (HTOL) testing; and e) reducing overall system costs.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.