Half-bridge gate driver improves power system performance in hybrid vehicles

Paul Boughton

Texas Instruments’ 120V automotive grade half-bridge gate driver provides a propagation delay at 15ns with short rise and fall times and the tightest delay matching of 1ns for 12-V to 48-V DC/DC power supplies.

The   high-side/low-side gate driver offers advanced noise tolerance, resulting in improved overall system performance for hybrid vehicles.

The UCC27201A-Q1 is the only automotive gate driver to offer negative voltage handling capability on the high-side pin, making the product more immune to noise. An integrated 120-V bootstrap diode also allows for N-channel MOSFET control and eliminates the need for external discrete diodes.

Key features and benefits of the UCC27201A-Q1:

* Reduces solution size and weight: Features the industry’s fastest propagation delays at 15ns, faster rise and fall times at 7ns, allowing the system to switch efficiently at high frequencies. This reduces the size and weight of magnetics and heat sinks, ultimately lightening the vehicle load and resulting in longer mileage.

* Protects the power supply: The tightest delay matching of 1ns protects the power supply from short-circuiting and failing.

* Reduces cycle-by-cycle switching losses: Improves power-conditioning efficiency and allows the system to switch at high frequencies in hundreds of kilohertz, allowing for smaller system size and weight.

* Provides advanced noise toleration: The best negative-voltage handling at the switched-node pin creates the ability to tolerate noise, causing virtually no malfunctions in the electronic system.

* Drives MOSFETs over a wide power range: Allows the use of any MOSFET in multiple power levels.