Panasonic Corporation

Panasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.

Atsushi Morimoto

Tsuyoshi Tanaka

Yasuhiro Uemoto

Tatsuo Morita

Kouichi Ishikawa

Matsuo Shiraishi

A gate driver circuit capable of quickly driving a semiconductor device without erroneous ignitions. It has a positive power supply for forward bias, a negative power supply for backward bias, a first bias circuit that outputs the positive- or negative-power-supply voltage according to gate driver signal S, a capacitor that is charged by the negative-power-supply voltage when the first bias circuit outputs the negative-power-supply voltage, and a second bias circuit that supplies the gate of the semiconductor device with the positive- or negative-power-supply voltage according to gate driver signal S. Only in an early stage of a transition period during which the semiconductor device is turned on, the second bias circuit supplies the gate of the semiconductor device, instead of the positive-power-supply voltage, with a voltage boosted by adding the charged voltage of the capacitor onto the positive-power-supply voltage outputted from the first bias circuit.

Gate driver circuit and power conversion apparatus using same

A motor driving circuit includes a three-phase inverter circuit, including three upper-arm switching elementstofor driving upper arms of different phases of a three-phase motor, and three lower-arm switching elementstofor driving lower arms of different phases. At least one of the upper-arm switching elementstoand the lower-arm switching elementstois a semiconductor element that performs a diode operation. The diode operation is an operation in which a voltage less than or equal to a threshold voltage of a gate electrode G is applied to the gate electrode G with reference to a potential of a first ohmic electrode S, thereby conducting a current flow from the first ohmic electrode S to a second ohmic electrode D and blocking a current flow from the second ohmic electrode D to the first ohmic electrode S.

Motor driving circuit

A power conversion circuit includes a bidirectional switch. The bidirectional switchhas a first gate terminal G, a second gate terminal G, a first ohmic terminal Sand a second ohmic terminal S. The bidirectional switchhas four operation states. In the first state, the bidirectional switchoperates as a diode having a cathode as the first ohmic terminal Sand an anode as the second ohmic terminal S. In a second state, the bidirectional switchoperates as a diode having an anode as the first ohmic terminal Sand a cathode as the second ohmic terminal S. In a third state, the bidirectional switchis bidirectionally conductive with via a diode between the first and second ohmic terminals Sand S. In a fourth state, the bidirectional switchcuts off a bidirectional current between the first and second ohmic terminals.

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Aichi, Japan

Atsushi Morimoto