Technologies and applications of Al‐free high‐power laser diodes

We report high‐power technologies in 0.8‐µm Al‐free InGaAsP/InGaP laser diodes. To realize the high‐power operation, the improvement of catastrophic optical mirror damage (COMD) power density level is required. In addition to the use of low surface recombination velocity of Al‐free materials, optimization of waveguide thickness in broad waveguide structure with tensile‐strained barriers and current blocking structure near facets has led to high COMD power density level. Highly stable operation of Al‐free laser diodes with these structures has been obtained over 2500 hours at 2 W from a stripe width of µm. Applications of high‐power laser diodes are also described. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electr Eng Jpn, 158(1): 53–59, 2007; Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience.wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/eej.20286     

Formation of MgAu alloy cathode by photolithography and its application to organic light‐emitting diodes and organic field effect transistors

To make an efficient electron injection electrode by photolithography, we studied MgAu alloy electrodes, which have a low work function and high resistance to humidity and oxygen. The measured work function of MgAu alloy thin film was 3.7 eV, which is comparable with that of a pure Mg layer and ～0.8 eV lower than that of a pure Au layer. This low work function was maintained even after photolithography, suggesting excellent stability for solvent treatment. Investigating organic field‐effect transistor (OFET) characteristics when MgAu alloy comb type source and drain electrodes were used, we successfully obtained n‐type FET operation. Furthermore, organic light‐emitting diodes (OLEDs) demonstrated the efficient electron injection characteristics of the MgAu alloy cathode, which were similar to those of the conventional MgAg cathode. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electr Eng Jpn, 152(1): 37–42, 2005; Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience.wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/ eej.20153     

A new single‐phase high‐power‐factor converter with buck and buck–boost hybrid operation

In recent years, a wide variety of high‐power‐factor converter schemes have been proposed to solve the harmonic problem. The schemes are based on conventional boost, buck, or buck–boost topology, and their performance, such as output voltage control range in the boost and buck topology or efficiency in the buck–boost topology, is limited. To solve this, the authors propose a single‐phase high‐power‐factor converter with a new topology obtained from a combination of buck and buck–boost topology. The power stage performs the buck and buck–boost operations by a compact single‐stage converter circuit while the simple controller/modulator appropriately controls the alternation of the buck and buck–boost operation and maintains a high‐quality input current during both the buck and buck–boost operations. The proposed scheme results in a high‐performance rectifier with no limitation of output voltage control range and a high efficiency. In this paper, the principle and operation of the proposed converter scheme are described in detail and the theory is confirmed through experimental results obtained from 2‐kW prototype converter. © 2000 Scripta Technica, Electr Eng Jpn, 131(3): 91–100, 2000     

Thermal analysis of multi‐finger GaInP collector‐up heterojunction bipolar transistors with miniature heat‐dissipation packaging structures

We build up a finite element modeling (FEM) approach to analyze the thermal performance of collector‐up (C‐up) heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBTs) with a heat‐dissipation via configuration. Highly compact heat‐dissipation packaging structures of GaInP/GaAs C‐up HBTs have been designed and evaluated systematically. In this work, we devise the 2‐D and 3‐D models to simulate the actual devices and to investigate the temperature distribution behavior. Results from 2‐D model indicate that the large heat‐dissipation via configuration can be further reduced by 29% to meet the requirement of HBT‐based small high‐power amplifiers (HPAs) for the cellular phones. Furthermore, the demonstrated results show that the maximum temperature within the collector calculated from 3‐D model is lower than that from 2‐D model. In the 3‐D analysis, it is revealed that the configuration can be reduced by 32%. Therefore, thinning the heat‐dissipation via constructed underneath the GaInP/GaAs C‐up HBT should be helpful for miniaturization of HBT‐based HPAs in future mobile communication systems. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A novel strategy for a high‐power utility interactive inverter with a series active filter

High‐power utility interactive inverters used for large‐capacity energy storage systems are composed of multiple connected inverters, in order to realize high efficiency and high performance of the harmonic elimination characteristic simultaneously. Some disadvantages of multiple connected inverters, such as harmonic current flowing from an inverter unit to the other one, and increase of the number of inverter units, cannot be overcome easily. This paper presents a novel strategy for a high‐power utility interactive inverter, which is composed of a large power with low‐switching‐frequency PWM inverter (high‐power PWM inverter), an LC passive filter, and a series active filter (series AF). Because harmonic components contained in the utility line current are absorbed by the series AF, the switching frequency of the PWM inverter can be selected to about 1 kHz. In addition because the power capacity and the output voltage of the series AF can be suppressed lower than 10% of the power capacity and the output voltage of PWM inverter, low‐voltage and high‐speed power devices can be applied to the series AF. Consequently, high power, high efficiency, and high harmonics elimination performance can be realized without increasing the number of inverter units. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electr Eng Jpn, 141(2): 57–66, 2002; Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience.wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/eej.10048