Estimating Remaining Life and Availability of Power Semiconductor Devices using Sympathetic String Theory, Dynamic Safe Operating Area and Ultrasound Resonators

摘要：功率变换器是大多数需要电力的消费和工业产品不可缺少的组成部分。各个领域，如即将到来的全电动飞机工业，现有的电机驱动市场，太空任务，电动汽车，卫生部门，可再生能源市场，高压直流（HVDC）变电站和许多其他领域都需要使用电源转换器。功率半导体模块是任何功率转换系统中不可缺少的元件，特别是在需要大而关键的功率时。不幸的是，这些功率半导体模块容易发生故障，当它们发生故障时，结果可能是灾难性的。当大功率半导体模块受到热应力和电应力因素时，会发生自然退化，最终导致其性能下降，甚至在预期寿命之前导致故障，从而导致系统瘫痪，并造成经济、安全和环境问题。确定电源变换器的剩余寿命是保证电力电子系统不间断运行的最终目标。使用所提出的方法，任何需要大量但关键功率的电力电子应用都将受益。该项目将通过部署可应用于现有绝缘栅双极晶体管（IGBT）和金属氧化物半导体场效应晶体管（MOSFET）模块封装的自我监控系统，显著帮助制造商和最终用户提高系统可靠性。该解决方案还可以提供实时警报，以识别设备不断变化的健康状况，扩大对退化/故障过程的现有知识，并预测剩余使用寿命。建立这样一个先进的可靠性框架将导致一种新的实时健康监测工具，这将有利于任何具有高额定功率的电力电子应用。本项目旨在利用基于超声谐振器的在线原位无创技术和动态安全操作区域（SOA）知识，寻找一种全面的解决方案来确定功率半导体模块的实时健康状态和剩余寿命。两项研究成果有助于实现这一目标：第一部分确定使用嵌入式超声传感器的老化水平，该传感器将是活的和非侵入性的，并且可以应用于现有的IGBT和MOSFET模块封装。交感弦理论将首次用于将超声波与设备退化联系起来。第二部分介绍了依赖于时间的SOA的概念，这被认为是设备故障的潜在原因，特别是当设备遭受意外过电压/电流时。简而言之，该项目设想可以通过完成一个精确的在线降级监视工具来估计设备降级，该工具将确定动态SOA。老化和动态SOA之间的相关性提供了设备的有用剩余寿命或电路的可用性。因此，本研究将提供一个集成框架，使电力电子转换器系统能够进行自主健康评估，该项目的结果将通过执行预防性定期维护来显着提高电力转换器的使用寿命，从而最终提高系统可用性并降低成本。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Ultrasound based Lifetime Prediction of Power Electronic Modules using the Concept of Dynamic Safe Operating AreaAbstract: A power converter is an integral part of most consumer and industrial products needing electric power. Various segments such as upcoming all-electric aircraft industry, existing motor drive market, space mission, electric automotive, health sector, renewable energy market, high voltage direct current (HVDC) substation and many others require the use of power converters. Power semiconductor modules are indispensable elements in any power conversion system, especially where heavy but critical power is required. Unfortunately, these power semiconductor modules are failure-prone and when they fail, results can be catastrophic. When thermal and electrical stress factors are subjected to large power semiconductor modules, natural degradation takes place, which eventually degrades their performance and leads to failures even before their expected lifespan, thus bringing down the system and cause economic, safety, and environmental problems. Finding the remaining life of a power converter is the ultimate objective to ensure uninterrupted operation of a power electronic system. Using the proposed methods, any power electronic application requiring heavy but critical power will be benefitted. This project will significantly help the manufacturers and end users to increase the system reliability by deploying a self-monitoring system that can be applied to the existing insulated-gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) and metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) module packaging. This solution can also provide real-time alarms to identify device’s changing health conditions, broaden the existing knowledge of the degradation/failure process and predict remaining useful life. Establishing such an advanced reliability framework will lead to a new real-time health monitoring tool, which will benefit any power electronic application with high power ratings. This project aims to find a comprehensive solution to determine the real-time state of health and remaining life of a power semiconductor module using online in-situ, non-invasive technique based on ultrasound resonators and the knowledge of dynamic safe operating area (SOA). Two research outcomes contribute to this goal: The first part determines the level of aging using embedded ultrasound sensors, which will be live and non-intrusive in nature, and can be applied to existing IGBT and MOSFET module packaging. For the first time, sympathetic string theory will be used to associate ultrasound with device degradation. The second part introduces the concept of age depended SOA, which is believed to be the underlying reason for device failure especially when the device is subjected to accidental over voltage/current. In short, the project envisions that device degradation can be estimated by accomplishing an accurate online degradation monitoring tool, which will determine the dynamic SOA. The correlation between aging and dynamic SOA provides the useful remaining life of the device or the availability of a circuit. Therefore, this research will provide an integrated framework enabling autonomous health assessment for power electronic converter systems, and the outcome of this project will significantly improve the lifespan of the power converters by performing preventive scheduled maintenance, which will eventually lead to increased system availability and reduced cost.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.