IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 39, NO.

4, JULY/AUGUST 2003

915

A Comparative Evaluation of New Silicon Carbide

Diodes and State-of-the-Art Silicon Diodes
for Power Electronic Applications
Ahmed Elasser, Member, IEEE, Mustansir H. Kheraluwala, Member, IEEE, Mario Ghezzo,
Robert L. Steigerwald, Fellow, IEEE, Nicole Andrea Evers, James Kretchmer, and T. Paul Chow, Senior Member, IEEE

AbstractRecent progress in silicon carbide (SiC) material has

made it feasible to build power devices of reasonable current density. This paper will present recent results including a comparison with state-of-the-art silicon diodes. Switching losses for two
silicon diodes (a fast diode, 600 V, 50 A, 60 ns Trr), an ultrafast
silicon diode (600 V, 50 A, 23 ns Trr), and a 4H-SiC diode (600 V,
50 A) are compared. The effect of diode reverse recovery on the
turn-on losses of a fast insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) are
studied both at room temperature and at 150 C. At room temperature, SiC diodes allow a reduction of IGBT turn-on losses by 25%
compared to ultrafast silicon diodes and by 70% compared to fast
silicon diodes. At 150 C junction temperature, SiC diodes allow
turn-on loss reductions of 35% and 85% compared to ultrafast and
fast silicon diodes, respectively.
The silicon and SiC diodes are used in a boost converter with
the IGBT to assess the overall effect of SiC diodes on the converter
characteristics. Efficiency measurements at light load (100 W)
and full load (500 W) are reported. Although SiC diodes exhibit
very low switching losses, their high conduction losses due to the
high forward drop dominate the overall losses, hence reducing
the overall efficiency. Since this is an ongoing development, it
is expected that future prototypes will have improved forward
characteristics.
Index Terms4H-SiC, carbide, diode, insulated gate bipolar
transistor (IGBT), recovery, reverse, silicon, silicon carbide (SiC).

I. INTRODUCTION

N MOST power electronics applications, diode reverse-recovery switching losses are a significant part of the overall
losses. In addition to their inherent losses due to the reverse
Paper IPCSD 03036, presented at the 1999 Industry Applications Society
Annual Meeting, Phoenix, AZ, October 37, and approved for publication in
the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS by the Power Electronics
Devices and Components Committee of the IEEE Industry Applications Society.
Manuscript submitted for review January 9, 2001 and released for publication
April 10, 2003. This work was supported by the Defense Advanced Research
Projects Agency under Contract MDA 972-98-C0001.
A. Elasser, R. L. Steigerwald, N. A. Evers, and J. Kretchmer are
with the GE Global Research Center, Niskayuna, NY 12309 USA
(e-mail: elasser@crd.ge.com; steigerwald@crd.ge.com; evers@crd.ge.com;
kretchmer@crd.ge.com).
M. H. Kheraluwala was with the GE Global Research Center, Niskayuna, NY
12309 USA. He is now with Osram Sylvania, Inc., Lake Zurich, IL 60047 USA
(e-mail: mustansir.kheraluwala@sylvania.com).
M. Ghezzo, retired, was with the GE Global Research Center, Niskayuna,
NY 12309. He is now at 404 Schauber Road, Ballston Lake, NY 12019 USA
(e-mail: mario.ghezzo@worldnet.att.net).
T. P. Chow is with the Department of Electrical, Computer and Systems
Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY 12180 USA (e-mail:
chowt@rpi.edu).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TIA.2003.813730

recovery, diode reverse recovery affects the switching devices

such as insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs), MOSFETs,
etc., in the form of additional turn-on losses. Other adverse effects of reverse recovery include electromagnetic interference
(EMI), and additional thermal management. Silicon diodes have
reached their theoretical limits in terms of reverse recovery time.
State of the art silicon diodes exhibit reverse-recovery times as
low as 25 ns. Any reduction in the reverse-recovery time would
require a drastic improvement of the current technology or a
change of the material. Recent progress in silicon carbide (SiC)
material and processing [1] allows designers to acquire relatively large diameter wafers with small micropipe density [2].
In turn, this allows process engineers to build large-area devices
for power applications.
The material properties of 4H-SiC makes it a natural choice
for high-power, high-temperature, and high-frequency applications [3]. Its high electric breakdown of 2 10 V/cm allows
it to support very high voltage across a thin layer. A 5000-V
diode in SiC would require a 40- m-thick drift layer compared
to almost 500 m in Si. The high carrier drift velocity of 2
10 cm/s allows for fast removal of charge. The latter is very
useful in bipolar devices such as PiN diodes, where minority
carriers need to be removed as fast as possible to allow for
fast switching times [4]. The high thermal conductivity of
4.9 W/cm K allows for high-temperature operation and better
thermal management. Table I summarizes these properties and
also shows Si and GaAs material properties for comparison
purposes.
This paper presents the results of a comparison be60 ns), ultrafast
tween 600-V 50-A fast (IR40EPF06-Trr
25 ns) Si diodes and 4H-SiC diodes
(HFA50PA60C-Trr
with respect to reverse-recovery losses. These diodes were
used in an IGBT boost converter and IGBT turn-on losses
were measured at room temperature and at 150 C. The IGBT
turn-on losses and diode turn-off losses are measured with the
circuit of Fig. 1, in a double shot mode. The SiC diodes used
are still on the wafer and not yet packaged. A probe station
is used to connect the SiC diodes to the test circuit. 4H SiC
diodes with a 5 m drift layer thickness were used. Three die
sizes are available as shown in Fig. 2 (4 mm 4 mm, 800 m
800 m, and 250 m 250 m).
The packaged SiC diodes are also tested using the circuit
of Fig. 6 (boost converter operating in continuous conduction
mode). Each packaged SiC diode contains two 800 m
800 m dies in a parallel configuration. These diodes are also
compared to the previous silicon (fast and ultrafast) diodes with

0093-9994/03$17.00 2003 IEEE

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TABLE I
SILICON CARBIDE, SILICON, AND GALLIUM ARSENIDE MATERIAL PROPERTIES

(a)

Fig. 1.

Reverse-recovery test setup.

(b)
Fig. 3. (a) Silicon carbide Schottky rectifier device cross section. (b) Silicon
carbide PiN rectifier device cross section.

Fig. 2.

Silicon carbide pin wafer.

the same IGBT. In addition to demonstrating the silicon carbide

operation in continuous mode at relatively moderate power and
at high voltages, this test allows also for an overall comparison
of losses which includes conduction losses. Efficiency results
are compared for the three cases.
II. DEVICE DESIGN AND FABRICATION
A. Schottkys versus PiN Junction Rectifiers
Generally, high-voltage power rectifiers are categorized into
two classesthe unipolar Schottky rectifier and the bipolar

junction rectifier [5]. The schematic cross sections of the basic

structures of these two rectifiers are shown in Fig. 3(a) and (b).
Whether a unipolar or a bipolar rectifier is preferred depends
on many device parameters, such as reverse blocking voltage,
forward current density, maximum allowable reverse current
density, operating temperature, and switching frequency. The
particular device type is often chosen to either minimize the
total power dissipation or maximize the safe operating area
(SOA) during device turn-on or turn-off.
As far as the process technology is concerned, the Schottky
rectifier is constructed on the metalsemiconductor junctions
whereas the junction rectifier is based on the pn junctions. The
device process technology of the former depends on the choice
of the Schottky metal as well as on the surface cleaning techniques and post-metal deposition annealing procedure. By contrast, the junction rectifier characteristics are controlled by the
pn junction formation technology; the most popular of which are
in-situ doped epitaxy and compensation doping by ion implantation. Due to its bipolar nature, the junction rectifier is very sensi-

ELASSER et al.: COMPARATIVE EVALUATION OF NEW SILICON CARBIDE DIODES AND STATE-OF-THE-ART SILICON DIODES

Fig. 4.

917

Fig. 5. A cross section of the fabricated 5-m EPI layer SiC PiN diodes.

Drift layer thickness versus doping level and breakdown voltage.

tive to the carrier lifetimes of the material. For the purpose of this
study, we designed and tested PiN diodes. Schottky diodes with
similar ratings are also feasible, but were not used for this comparison. SiC Schottky diodes will perform better than the PiN at
these voltage levels due to their inherent lower forward voltage
drop and to their lack of minority carriers during switching.
B. PiN Diode Design Considerations

Fig. 6. Hybrid 500-W Si/SiC boost converter.

and doping for a speTo estimate the drift layer thickness

cific reverse voltage for 4H-SiC, we can use Fig. 4. Fig. 4 shows
, the drift layer thickthat for a given breakdown voltage
ness is dependent on the doping concentration in this layer. A
rule of thumb for SiC is 100 V/ m to 125 V/ m, which yields
about 56 m thickness for a 600 V SiC PiN diode. The forward voltage drop of a PiN junction rectifier consists of the drop
across the middle region ( ) and the drops across the two end
junctions according to
(1)
and
are the voltage drops across the anode
where
and cathode junctions, respectively, and the mid-region drop
depends strongly on carrier recombination lifetime. The reverse leakage current for SiC rectifiers has been found to be orders of magnitude higher than that predicted by standard silicon
theory extensions. Obviously, material defects, such as screw
dislocations, play a role in determining the reverse current [6],
[7]. With the improvement in material quality, fairly low reverse
current densities ( 10 cm ) have been observed, at least for
small-area devices [8].
C. Device Fabrication
PiN diodes were modeled, designed, and fabricated. Four
wafers were processed: two with 5- m n epi and two with
40- m-thick n epi N doped at 2 to 5e cm . The 40- m
n epitaxial (epi) layers (1e ) were grown on low or select
micropipe, production grade 4H wafers (1e ) and the 5- m
epi was grown on 4H research grade wafers. The junction
termination extensions (JTEs) were created by boron implantation, and the p anode was created by a boron implantation
with an aluminum/carbon co-implantation done at 650 C
to reduce contact resistance. An n guard ring was created

with a nitrogen implant. The junction terminations formed a

box implant profile done at 650 C using energies between
25300 keV with total doses of 1.9e , 1.2e , and 6.1e cm
for JTE-1, JTE-2, and JTE-3, respectively. All implants were
annealed at 1700 C in argon. Al/Ti was deposited for the
anode contact and Ni deposited on the backside for the cathode
contact and annealed at 950 C in Argon to create the ohmic
contacts. A device cross section is given in Fig. 5.
III. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
With the circuit of Fig. 1, SiC diodes are tested directly on
the wafer using a probe station. The diodes are heated to 150 C
using a thermal chuck. Si diodes are also tested under the same
conditions to account for all the circuit parasitics. A fast IGBT is
used as the main switch. For each diode, reverse recovery losses,
IGBT total turn-on losses as well as IGBT turn-on losses due to
diode reverse recovery are measured and compared at 25 C and
at 150 C.
With the boost converter circuit of Fig. 6, packaged SiC
diodes are tested under light load (100 W) all the way to
full load (500 W). Fig. 7 shows the SiC diode voltage and
current for a 200-W load. Circuit efficiency with SiC diodes is
compared to those with fast and ultrafast Si diodes.
A. Switching Efficiency
1) Fast Silicon Diode: Fig. 8(a) shows the diode and IGBT
voltage and current at room temperature for a 400-V dc voltage
and a 10-A load current. Diode reverse-recovery current is on
of 480 A/ s and the reversethe order of 28 A with a
) is on the order of 113 ns. The effect on the
recovery time (
IGBT current at turn-on is an increase in turn-on losses. The
reverse-recovery current contributes about 320 J out of the

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TABLE II
DIODES AND IGBT LOSS SUMMARY DUE TO DIODE REVERSE RECOVERY

Fig. 7. SiC diode voltage and current at 200-W load, 100-kHz switching
frequency, 2 s/div, 2 A/div, 100 V/div. Top waveform: current; bottom
waveform: voltage.

(a)

(a)

(b)
Fig. 9. (a) Voltage and current waveforms at 25 C when an ultrafast diode is
used as DUT, 50 ns/div, di=dt = 480 A/s. (b) Voltage and current waveforms
at 150 C when an ultrafast Si diode is used as DUT, 50 ns/div, di=dt =
480 A/s.

(b)
Fig. 8. (a) Voltage and current waveforms at 25 C when a fast diode is used
as DUT, 50 ns/div, di=dt = 480 A/s. (b) Voltage and current waveforms at
150 C when a fast diode is used as DUT, 50 ns/div, di=dt = 480 A/s.

total 360- J IGBT turn-on losses. The diode reverse-recovery

losses are on the order of 344 J with a reverse voltage of 776 V.
At 150 C, diode reverse-recovery losses increase to 704 J,
an increase of over 100% as shown in Fig. 8(b). The IGBT
turn-on losses increase to 960 J, with diode reverse recovery
contributing 912 J. The reverse-recovery current is on the order

of 37.6 A, the reverse voltage increases to 936 V, and the reverse-recovery time increases to 160 ns. The increase in junction temperature allows for an increase in lifetime and in the
amount of minority carriers stored in the drift layer. This has
a tremendous effect on converter efficiency and on the SOA of
the main switching device (IGBT in this case). These results are
summarized in Table II.
2) Ultrafast Silicon Diode: Fig. 9(a) and (b) shows the results for an ultrafast Si diode. At room temperature, the diode
reverse-recovery current is on the order of 11 A, almost 60%
less than the fast Si diode. The reverse-recovery time and the
reverse peak voltage are on the order of 70 ns and 548 V, a reduction of 40% and 30%, respectively. IGBT turn-on losses are

ELASSER et al.: COMPARATIVE EVALUATION OF NEW SILICON CARBIDE DIODES AND STATE-OF-THE-ART SILICON DIODES

919

TABLE III
BOOST CONVERTER EFFICIENCY WITH FAST, ULTRAFAST, AND SiC DIODES

(a)

magnitude than the fast and ultrafast Si diode results as shown

in Fig. 10(b). Reverse-recovery time increase slightly from 13
to 16 ns. The reverse voltage increases to about 808 V from
512 V at 25 C. The IGBT turn-on losses are not affected by
the temperature increase with the SiC diode in place remaining
at 56 J, but the SiC diode losses increased to 26 J for total
reverse-recovery losses of only 92 J. These results are shown
in Table II.
B. Converter Efficiency

(b)
Fig. 10. (a)Voltage and current waveforms at 25 C when an SiC diode is used
as DUT, 50 ns/div, di=dt = 480 A/s. (b) Voltage and current waveforms at
150 C when an SiC diode is used as DUT, 50 ns/div, di=dt = 480 A/s.

reduced to 136 J total with 88 J due to diode reverse-recovery

current. At 150 C, the diode reverse-recovery current and time
increase to 21.4 A and 96 ns, an increase of 100% and 37%,
respectively, as shown in Fig. 9(b). In comparison with the fast
Si diode, the reverse-recovery current and time are reduced by
44% and 40%, respectively. The reverse voltage is on the order
of 1330 V, higher than with a fast Si diode. The latter is due to
at reverse recovery and to the diode snappiness
the high
at turn-off. The diode and IGBT losses are 268 and 160 J, respectively. These results are summarized in Table II.
3) Silicon Carbide Diode: Fig. 10(a) and (b) shows the results for 4H-SiC diode. At room temperature, it is clear that the
very small reverse-recovery time and current of the SiC diode
has a substantial effect on the IGBT turn-on losses as shown in
Fig. 10(a). As expected, 92% and 80% decreases in reverse-recovery current are observed compared to the fast and ultrafast
Si diodes, respectively. The reverse-recovery time is reduced
by 100 ns (88%) and by 53 ns (81%) compared to fast and ultrafast Si diodes. Reverse-recovery voltage is also reduced by
264 V (34%) and by 36 V (7%) compared to fast and ultrafast
Si diodes. IGBT turn-on losses due to reverse recovery are reduced by 264 J (83%) and by 32 J (24%) to 56 J compared
to fast and ultrafast Si diodes. The diode turn-off loss is only
8 J at room temperature.
At 150 C, there is a slight increase in the reverse-recovery
current from 2.2 to 3.5 A (60%), but still smaller by orders of

Silicon carbide diodes packaged in a TO-254 package are

used in the boost converter of Fig. 6. Each diode is made with
two 800 m 800 m dies in parallel to handle the required
current continuously. The converter operates in a continuous
conduction mode at 100-kHz switching frequency. Fig. 7 shows
the overall switching waveforms of the converter with a silicon
carbide diode as freewheeling diode. These results are for a
500-W output power and for an input voltage of 50 V and an
output voltage of 100 V (50% duty cycle). As in the previous
case, switching losses are substantially reduced with silicon carbide diodes.
The overall efficiency of the converter is lower with silicon
carbide diodes, because of the higher conduction losses. These
losses are due to the high forward drop of the SiC diodes, which
is in turn due to the high energy bandgap ( ) of SiC (3.1 ev vs.
1.17 ev for Si) and to the high series resistance. In our case, the
SiC diodes have a forward drop as much as 34 V at 2.5 A. A
summary of the efficiency results is shown in Table III. This high
forward drop can be mitigated by using SiC Schottky diodes.
The SiC Schottky diodes have a much lower forward drop and
they also have lower switching losses since they are majority
carrier devices. With SiC Schottky diodes, the converter efficiency will be improved significantly.
IV. SUMMARY
These results demonstrate the advantage of using SiC devices.
In addition to providing low switching losses, low voltage, and
current stress, SiC devices can operate at much higher temperatures (up to 350 C). They also are able to operate at very high
voltages and very high switching frequencies. The benefits for
circuit designers are tremendous especially for applications that
require high voltages such as X-ray tube power supplies, high
temperature such as aircraft engine or space-borne power supplies, and high switching frequency such as high-density converters [9]. SiC diodes can also be used in hybrid applications
such as drive systems. The low switching losses, low reverse-recovery current, and time will allow power converters to operate
at high efficiency and low EMI with little or no snubbing.

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With the continuous improvement in the quality of the

starting material, fabrication technology and better lifetime
control, lower forward drop SiC devices will soon be available
[10]. High-voltage high-current modules are currently under
development by semiconductor companies around the world.
Niche applications that require very high temperatures and high
voltages are already benefiting from recent progress in silicon
carbide processing and fabrication.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors thank P. Gipp and M. Lazerri for their work on
fabricating the SiC devices. The authors also thank A. W. Clock,
M. Gibeau, E. Jacobson, and G. Croff for their help with testing
of the devices. They also acknowledge N. Ramungul for her
design efforts.
REFERENCES
[1] T. P. Chow and M. Ghezzo, SiC power devices, in Proc. Materials
Research Society Symp., vol. 423, 1996, pp. 921.
[2] J. W. Palmour, R. Singh, R. C. Glass, O. Kordina, and C. H. Carter, Jr.,
Silicon carbide for power devices, in Proc. Inte. Symp. Power Devices
and ICs, 1997, pp. 2532.
[3] C. S. Weitzel, J. W. Palmour, C. H. Carter, K. Moore, K. J. Nordquist,
S. Allen, C. Thero, and M. Bhatnagar, Silicon carbide high-power
devices, IEEE Trans. Electron Devices, vol. 43, pp. 17321741, Oct.
1996.
[4] S. K. Ghandi, Semiconductor Power Devices: Physics of Operation and
Fabrication Technology. New York: Wiley, 1977, pp. 100105.
[5] B. J. Baliga, Power Semiconductor Devices. Boston, MA: PWS, 1995,
pp. 128197.
[6] P. G. Neudeck, W. Huang, and M. Dudley, Study of bulk and elementary
screw dislocation assisted reverse breakdown in low-voltage (<250V)
4H-SiC p n junction diodes, Part 1: DC properties, IEEE Trans. Electron Devices, vol. 46, pp. 478484, Mar. 1999.
[7] P. G. Neudeck and C. Fazi, Study of bulk and elementary screw dislocation assisted reverse breakdown in low-voltage (<250V) 4H-SiC p n
junction diodes, Part 2: Dynamic breakdown properties, IEEE Trans.
Electron Devices, vol. 46, pp. 485492, Mar. 1999.
[8] T. P. Chow, V. Khemka, J. Fedison, N. Ramungul, K. Matocha, Y. Tang,
and R. Gutmann, SiC and GaN bipolar power devices, Solid State
Electron., vol. 44, no. 2, pp. 277301, 2000.
[9] V. R. Garuda, M. K. Kazimierczuk, M. L. Ramalingam, L. Tolkkinen,
and M. D. Roth, High temperature testing of a buck converter using
silicon and silicon carbide diodes, in Proc. IEEE PESC98, 1998, pp.
15611567.
[10] J. W. Palmour, R. Singh, R. C. Glass, O. Kordina, and C. H. Carter,
Silicon carbide for power devices, in Proc. IEEE Int. Symp. Power
Semiconductor Devices and ICs, 1997, pp. 2532.

Ahmed Elasser (S92M96) was born in Demnate,

Morocco, in 1963. He received the Bachelors degree
in electric power engineering from Mohammadia
School of Engineering, Rabat, Morocco, in 1985,
and the Masters and Ph.D. degrees in electric power
engineering and power electronics from Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, in 1993 and 1996,
respectively.
After spending seven years in Morocco working
as an Electrical Maintenance Engineer and then as a
Laboratory Engineer from 1986 to 1992, he joined
the GE Global Research Center, Niskayuna, NY, as a Senior Professional. His
various tasks involved the study, modeling, and application of power semiconductor devices, systems modeling and simulation, silicon carbide devices, Six
Sigma Quality, and e-engineering. In the past four years, he has been extensively involved with silicon carbide power devices modeling, testing, characterization, and potential applications. He has authored over 15 published papers
in the areas of power electronics, power devices, silicon carbide, and Six Sigma.

He is the holder of five patents, with a number of other patents pending. He is

currently working on the application of silicon carbide power devices, systems
modeling and simulation, and more recently on MEMS devices and sensors.
Dr. Elasser is a regular reviewer for the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER
ELECTRONICS. He received the Dushman Team Award from GE in 1996 and
numerous other awards for his work with GE Industrial Systems.

Mustansir H. Kheraluwala (S82M84) received

the B.Technology (Hons.) degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, India, in 1984, and
the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of
Wisconsin, Madison, in 1987 and 1991, respectively,
all in electrical engineering.
Since 2001, he has been with the Electronics Control Systems Division, Osram Sylvania, Inc. (OSI),
Lake Zurich, IL, managing new product development
of electronic ballasts for fluorescent lighting systems.
Prior to joining OSI, he was with General Electric
Company Corporate Research and Development for 11 years, involved in the
development of high-power-density converters for low-power utility, aerospace,
naval, and commercial applications. While there, he also led several programs
on developing high-power-density wire-bondless packaging technologies for
aerospace and medical applications. He was a member of the team that developed the worlds first electrodeless fluorescent lamp sold under the brand name
Genura. He has authored or coauthored over 20 publications and is the holder
of 14 patents.
Dr. Kheraluwala is an active member of the IEEE Industry Applications Society. He was a co-recipient of the 1995 GE Dushman Award.

Mario Ghezzo was born in Trieste, Italy, in 1937.

He received the Ph.D. degree in theoretical nuclear
physics from the University of Trieste, Trieste, Italy,
in 1962.
He served in the Italian Army as a Technical Officer in the Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC)
Defense Command and later held a post-doctorate
position in electronics and telecommunications at the
Istituto Superiore delle Poste e Telecomunicazioni,
Rome, Italy. From 1966 to 1969, he was a Physicist
with Sprague Electric Company, North Adams,
MA, where he applied optics of thin films and ellipsometry to MOS and
capacitor research. In 1969, he joined the General Electric Corporate Research
and Development Center (GE CRD), Schenectady, NY, where he developed
refractory gate MOS devices and IC processes. He studied novel techniques
of solid-state diffusion and chemical vapor deposition (CVD) for MOSFET
fabrication. He solved analytically for the first time the diffusion equation
with concentration-dependent diffusivity and applied this method for modeling
thermal redistribution of MOS source/drain implants in silicon. From 1971 to
1978, he was a co-developer of CID solid-state imaging devices at GE CRD.
He was responsible for the fabrication process. From 1979 to 1988, he led
the development of a 1.25-m CMOS technology including the successful
transition to production, He also managed a program to leverage the high-temperature capability of this technology for aircraft engine instrumentation, which
led to the investigation of wide-bandgap semiconductors to increase further the
upper temperature limit. In 1993, he co-developed silicon carbide (SiC) planar
MOSFETs and ICs for high-temperature electronics and pioneered nitrogen
and boron implantation in SiC. From 1994 to 2000, he managed several large
DoD-sponsored programs for the development of high-voltage high-power SiC
devices in cooperation with Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. At GE CRD he
introduced MEMS technology for miniaturizing smart sensors/actuators for
avionic use. In this area, he managed the development of a micromechanical
cross-point photonic switching array for optical networks under a DARPA
contract. He retired from GE in 2000 and is consulting for GE part-time.
He lectured at the VLSI Yield Enhancement summer course at Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, and at the University of Arizona, Tucson. He is
the holder of 28 patents and has authored or coauthored 70 technical papers. He
is the coauthor of Advanced CMOS Process Technology (New York: Academic,
1989). He has served on various Ph.D. dissertation committees and on the
Technology Advisory Board for Technology Transfer of the Semiconductor
Research Corporation.
Dr. Ghezzo is the recipient of two GE Dushman Awards.

ELASSER et al.: COMPARATIVE EVALUATION OF NEW SILICON CARBIDE DIODES AND STATE-OF-THE-ART SILICON DIODES

Robert L. Steigerwald (S66M79SM85F94)

received the B.S. degree in electrical engineering
with distinction from Clarkson University, Potsdam,
NY, in 1967, and the M.E.E. and Ph.D. degrees from
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, in 1968
and 1978, respectively.
In 1968, he joined the research staff of the GE
Global Research Center, Niskayuna, NY, where he
has conducted research and advanced development
of power converters for dc and ac motor drives,
induction heating, high-frequency lamp ballasts,
uninterruptible power supplies, utility interactive photovoltaics, and both
low-voltage and high-voltage power supplies including high power factor
supplies. Prior to joining GE Research, he was with the GE Semiconductor
Products Department, where he developed high-current diodes and SCRs. He
has authored 49 IEEE papers and is the holder of 94 patents,
Dr. Steigerwald received the 1993 William E. Newell Award from the IEEE
Power Electronics Society for outstanding achievement in power electronics.
He has served on the program committees for numerous IEEE APEC and
PESC Conferences and was an at-large member of the IEEE Power Electronics
Society Administrative Committee (19901992). He was appointed a Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Power Electronics Society for 19961998. He
has received three prize paper awards. He was an Associate Editor of the IEEE
TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS (19901998) and is a member of Eta
Kappa Nu. He was also a recent recipient of the IEEE Third Millennium Medal.

Nicole Andrea Evers received the Ph.D. degree in

electrical engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, in 1998.
Her primary research at Georgia Institute of Technology was in the area of microelectronics and packaging and included: modeling, design, and fabrication of InP HEMTs; circuit integration of thin-film
InP-based RTDs with silicon circuits; mixed material
integration of thin-film InP HBTs on silicon; highfrequency testing and characterization of high-speed
electronic devices; and integration, measurement and
modeling of high-frequency passive structures with active IIIV thin-film devices on silicon. Other areas of interest were RF amplifier design, communications, and photovoltaics. She joined the GE Global Research Center, Niskayuna,
NY, in the fall of 1997. She was a member of the Advanced Electronics Program,
where she developed, led, and supported projects in the areas of SiC and GaN
RF and power devices, thin-film passives, and packaging. In 1999, she joined
the Electronic Power Conversion Program, where she led the Ballast in a Socket
Project with DOE and GE Lighting and the Electronic Power Control Module
Project with GE Appliances. She became the Global Research Center Edison
Engineering Representative and Advanced Courses in Engineering Supervisor
in March 2001 and was assigned the task of building a training program at the
Global Research Center. After successfully establishing the Edison program at
the Global Research Center, she moved to the Electronic and Photonics Technologies Organization in June 2002, where she is currently leading a wiring
diagnostics program, providing technical support on due diligence efforts in
corporate acquisitions, and providing technical consulting in the RF/microwave
and optoelectronic sensors area. She has made numerous technical presentations
and is the author or coauthor of over 14 technical publications and the holder of
three patents.

921

James Kretchmer received the B.S. degree in photographic science from Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY, in 1979.
In 1986, he joined the GE Global Research
Center, Niskayuna, NY, where he has been involved
in fabrication programs for silicon smart power ICs
and discrete power devices, amorphous silicon flat
panel imagers, multichip module fabrication and,
most recently, development of silicon carbide and
GaN-based semiconductor devices. He is responsible
for online supervision of semiconductor processing
and process integration for various wide-band-gap semiconductor programs.
He has coauthored 12 technical papers and is the holder of three patents
pertaining to silicon carbide device fabrication.

T. Paul Chow (M77SM90) received the B.A. degree in mathematics and physics (summa cum laude)
from Augustana College, Sioux Falls, SD, in 1975,
the M.S. degree in materials science from Columbia
University, New York, NY, in 1977, and the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from Renssalaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, in 1982.
From 1977 to 1989, he was with General Electric
Corporate Research and Development, Schenectady,
NY. He was first involved with developing CVD processes and characterization of doped tin oxide and indium oxide thin films for transparent electrode applications in solid-state imagers, and then studied refractory metals and metal silicides for Si MOS VLSI
applications. From 1982 to 1989, he participated in the design and process development of new discrete and integrable MOS-gated unipolar and bipolar devices
(such as the MOSFET, IGBT, and MCT), and with process architecture and integration of high-voltage integrated circuits. Since 1989, he has been a member
of the faculty of the Electrical, Systems and Computer Engineering Department,
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where he is currently a Professor. His present
research interests are in developing new device concepts, integrated processes
and circuit models for high-voltage power devices and integrated circuits of silicon and wide-bandgap compound semiconductors. Since 1998, he has been
leading the Advanced Power Semiconductor Devices sub-thrust for the Center
for Power Electronics Systems, a National-Science-Foundation-sponsored Engineering Research Center consortium headed by Virginia Polytechnic Institute
and State University, with the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Renssalaer
Polytechnic Institute, North Carolina A&T and the University of Puerto Rico at
Mayaguez as participating universities. He has authored over 80 papers in refereed scientific journals, presented over 100 conference talks, contributed five
chapters in technical textbooks, and is the holder of over ten patents.
Dr. Chow received the Solid State Science and Technology Young Author
Award of the Electrochemical Society in 1982 and the Horizon Award from
Augustana College in 1986. He is a member of the Electrochemical Society.
From 1990 to 1997, he was the Editor for Solid State Power of the IEEE
TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRON DEVICES.