New Concepts for Multi-stressor Accelerated Testing of Power Electronic Components

Abstract:
Energy efficiency is most important for sustainable development, especially considering a projected growth of 40% to 70% in the renewable energy sector in the next twenty years. Efficient, robust, and reliable Power Electronics (PE) are central to the said efficient energy production and utilization, therefore an enabling factor for the green transition of technologies for the development of both industrial infrastructure and sustainable cities, and communities. Increasing the reliability and robustness of power semiconductors and Printed Circuit Board Assemblies (PCBA), which are heart of the PE systems is an important goal for this targeted efficiency and sustainability. For power semiconductors, the failure mechanisms due to temperature stresses, new device packaging materials and design evaluation, the lifetime models are of great interest and can be studied from accelerated power cycling test. For PCBA, currently, there is growing research on the influence of humidity conditions on the acceleration of corrosion on PCBA surface, a risk prediction models for climate related failure modes of PCBA using probabilistic methods for predictive maintenance decisions is in need.
Based on the above-mentioned, this Ph.D. project focuses on the study of advanced power cycling tests on power semiconductors and developing the failure models of PCBA when a particular climate condition is present in the device.

Funding: REPEPS project