Ultrafast Characteristics of Integrated High-Power Photoconductive Semiconductor Switch Based on 4H-SiC Substrate

Abstract

To minimize the rise time and full-width at half-maximum (FWHM) of the output waveform, we have designed and fabricated a novel integrated device based on semi-insulated silicon carbide (SiC) material, which we call cPCSS device, whose structure includes a photoconductive semiconductor switch (PCSS) and a charging capacitor. Test results indicate that, owing to optimized circuit connections and a simplified electrical length in cPCSS, the parasitic capacitance and inductance in the test circuit are decreased. Consequently, the cPCSS device exhibits faster signal while maintaining basically equal conductivity. At the incident laser energy ( $10~\mu $ J), cPCSS obtains the output signal with the fastest rise time of 122 ps (10%–90%) and FWHM of 375 ps. In addition, the cPCSS device can maintain a peak output voltage exceeding 10 kV and continuously output signals for more than 180 000 times without any faults.