A Novel Self-Pinching Gate Biasing Scheme for Safe Operation and Characterization of GaN HEMTs

Published in:
IEEE Microwave Wireless Compon. Lett., vol. 19, no. 5, pp. 302-304 (2009).
© Copyright 2009 IEEE - All Rights Reserved. Personal use of this material is permitted. However, permission to reprint/republish this material for advertising or promotional purposes or for creating new collective works for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or to reuse any copyrighted component of this work in other works must be obtained from the IEEE.

Abstract:
This letter presents a novel gate bias configuration for GaN HEMTs that ensures a safe operation of this kind of device by protecting the gate from forward turn-on. The bias circuit includes a simple series diode in the dc path that blocks any positive current from the gate, in other words it restricts the gate diode of the device to operate in forward bias. The new bias circuit ensures a safe operating condition of FET/HEMT transistors during forward turn-on while not hampering or degrading performance under normal operating condition.

Index Terms:
Bias network, GaN HEMT, load-pull.

Full version in pdf-format.