Kent Royd N.

Aying BSEE III – H

TECHNICAL WEBINAR 2
INDUSTRIAL APPLICATIONS OF MOSFETs: A REACTION PAPER

The technical webinar entitled “Industrial Applications of MOSFETs” that was

conducted last July 16, 2021 and was facilitated by the department of Electronics and
Communications Engineering mainly tackled about this tiny electronic component named metal-
oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor or popularly known as MOSFET and its huge role in
the industry.

The webinar’s speaker is Engr. Andrew Salido who has great mastery and experience
with regards to the point of interest. So as he began, he first broke the discussion into subparts
from MOSFET’s history and its industrial application. He further talked about the importance of
semiconductor testing, MOSFET parameter testing, its characteristic curve and its bench test
instrument. As such, he then began introducing us to the main course of the second technical
webinar. It was mentioned that the MOSFET was invented by Mohamed M. Atalla and Dawon
Kahng at Bell Labs in 1959, and first presented in 1960. It is the basic building block of modern
electronics and is considered as the most frequently manufactured device in history. The
MOSFET is a metal oxide semiconductor device and is a special type of field-effect transistor. It
is a voltage controlled device and is mostly used as a switching and an amplifier in electronic
circuits. Moreover, MOSFETs are present in these industrial applications from chopper circuits;
inverters; DC Motors; DC relays; digital circuits; primary DC-DC MOSFET; synchronous
rectifier DC-DC and AC-DC; power supplies; motor drive; load switches; wireless chargers;
telecommunication or server power supplies; power management and protection; lastly, battery
management. The following aforementioned are some of the industrial applications where
MOSFETs are evident and plays a vital role. Furthermore, he also mentioned that MOSFETs
have two types which are the depletion mode wherein when there is zero voltage on the gate
terminal, the channel show its maximum conductance. As the voltage on the gate is negative or
positive, then decreases the channel conductivity. On the other hand, there is enhancement mode
wherein when there is no voltage on the gate terminal, the device does not conduct. More voltage
applied on the gate terminal, the device has good conductivity. In addition, a MOSFET has three
terminals: source, gate, and drain. MOSFETs are by far the most common transistor, appearing
in both analog and digital circuits. The field effect works via voltage, and the voltage and
resistance of the MOSFET are indirectly proportional to each other as the voltage is increased at
the gate, where a threshold voltage is exceeded, and the resistance from the drain to the source
reduces very quickly.
 Moving on, Engr. Salido tackled about semiconductor testing which is a process of
testing semiconductor devices to check if they are manufactured or behaving according to the
specifications guaranteed by the manufacturers. With that specifications mentioned, datasheet
then comes in wherein it is a document that summarizes the performance and other technical
characteristics of a product, machine, component, material, a subsystem or software in sufficient
detail to be used by a design engineer to integrate the component into a system. We can inspect a
semiconductor device in a variety of ways, including continuity or contact tests, open or short
tests, leakage current tests, voltage tests, functional tests, stress tests, and switching tests. It is
necessary to have these components tested for these will be used and integrated for the advent of
communications, computing, healthcare, military systems, transportation, and other applications.
After a while, he got into the much more technical and specific parts of the webinar. It was the
important parameters in MOSFET industrial applications such as VGSTH where it is a test that
determines the gate voltage necessary to conduct a certain amount of drain current usually 250
uA by driving the current into the drain and then measuring the gate to source voltage. Next,
BVDSS which is a device specification that checks the forward breakdown voltage from the
drain to the source that the device can withstand before entering avalanche breakdown. It is
typically specified as a minimum value in the device specifications, but it is usually tested to a
low limit to ensure that it meets specifications and a high limit to check for high epi resistivity or
the wrong epi, which could cause Rdson failures. Third parameter is IGSS which examines the
leakage current from the gate to the source by providing a voltage (usually 10V for logic level
parts or 20V for standard gate types) from the gate to the source and measuring the current from
the gate to the source. The source terminal is shorted to the drain, and the source terminal is
shorted to the gate. Fourth, IDSS checks the leakage current from the drain to the source by
applying a voltage from the drain to the source and then measuring the current from the drain to
the source. Fifth, when the device is turned on, RDSON checks the resistance between the drain
and source, and this test is performed by applying a fixed voltage from gate to source, forcing a
current pulse into the drain, and measuring the Drain-Source voltage drop. Sixth, VSD measures
the forward voltage drop across the intrinsic diode (P-N Junction) formed from the drain-body
junction, and this test is performed by applying a fixed voltage from gate to source, then forcing
a current pulse into the drain where it is used to reduce die heating which will increase the Vsd.
The gate is shorted to the source during this test and the amount of current (Is) used is dependent
on the device current rating readings. Then, another parameter is the GFS – Conductance. The
VGSON parameter was also briefly explained. Lastly; the UIL – Stress Test/ Robustness Test/
Destructive Test parameter was mentioned.

All in all, the webinar simply put emphasis on the unlikely humongous importance
coming from a tiny device and how it affects us greatly in our daily lives. Moreover, it is
enriching in the part of the attendees considering how important it is to take a closer look unto
the reality of the electronic realm and its impact unto its consumers.