High Isolation DC/DC Converters for Gate Drivers

DC/DC converters are often required to provide an isolated asymmetric supply for high-side gate drivers. The simplest (functional) isolation can withstand 1kVDC for one second. This sounds impressive; however this is often not sufficient.

High side inverters are often floated a few hundred volts with an opto-isolated PWM control, so the gate drivers need an isolated power supply. This isolated supply is typically +15/-9V for IGBT, +20/-5V or +15/-3V for SiC or +6V and +9V for GaN. A typical DC/DC isolation voltage would be at least twice the working voltage, but the high ambient temperature and fast switching edges generated by these high-power transistors additionally stress the insulation barrier. RECOM combines the required asymmetric output voltages, high insulation voltage and low isolation capacitance into one simple DC/DC converter module. Whether IGBT, SiC MOSFET or GaN HEMT, RECOM has the matching drop-in product.