Did You Know...
...that the x-ray was discovered purely by accident? When German physicist Wilhelm Konrad von Roentgen was experimenting with cathode rays in 1895, he put an activated Crookes tube in a book and went out to lunch. When he returned, he discovered that a key that had also been placed in the book showed up as an image on the developed film!
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 7602229 | High frequency control of a semiconductor switch Resonant gate driver circuits provide for efficient switching of, for example, a MOSFET. However, often an operation of the resonant gate driver circuit does not allow for an application where high switching frequencies are required. According to the present inventi... | 10/13/2009 |
| 7352233 | Efficient thyristor-type power switches The highest-power switches now available are based on thyristor-type devices: GTOs (Gate turn-off thyristors), MTOs (MOS controlled turn-off thyristors), IGCTs (Integrated gate commutated thyristors), and the new ETOs (Emitter turn-off thyristors). These devices han... | 04/01/2008 |
| 7180921 | Method and apparatus for driving laser diode sources A method and apparatus for driving a laser diode source, such as a laser diode or a laser diode array. The driver controlling current in response to a signal indicative of excessive current or current density. The signal may be derived from the drive current, the vo... | 02/20/2007 |
| 7137385 | Device to provide a regulated power supply for in-cylinder ionization detection by using the ignition coli fly back energy and two-stage regulation This feature of the present invention comprises a method and apparatus that provides a regulated power supply for in-cylinder ionization detection by harvesting the excess ignition coil leakage and magnetizing energy immediately following the turn off of the ignitio... | 11/21/2006 |
| 7116003 | Aircraft starter/generator electrical system with mixed power architecture A starter/generator electrical system for gas turbine powered aircraft with mixed power architecture to combine advantages of each. The mixed power architecture may be selected from constant frequency (CF), adjustable variable frequency (AVF) and narrow range variab... | 10/03/2006 |
| 7095634 | Arc welding set with power source and inverter A welding machine with a power source and an inverter. The inverter has at least one switching leg, made up of switches in series, and an output terminal. The power source has a circuit for controlling the switches by delivering an on-signal or and off-signal. The p... | 08/22/2006 |
| 7095601 | High energy primary spark ignition system for a gas turbine engine An exciter circuit for a gas turbine engine delivers a first single high-energy spark followed by subsequent sparks of relatively lower energy to ensures start reliability by specifically clearing ice build-up at the ignition plugs. ... | 08/22/2006 |
| 7005855 | Device to provide a regulated power supply for in-cylinder ionization detection by using the ignition coil fly back energy and two-stage regulation The present invention is directed to a dual charge rate power supply circuit and method for ionization detection. The circuit includes a first diode, first and second capacitors, and first and second current paths. The first diode includes an anode operably connecte... | 02/28/2006 |
| 6967520 | Gate drive circuit, which makes the gate-charge flow back to the load and the main power source A gate driving circuit having: a direct current power source; a driving signal source for outputting signal; a main switch device, having a gate terminal in which the signal outputted from the driving signal source is inputted, for controlling a conduction state bet... | 11/22/2005 |
| 6952335 | Solid-state DC circuit breaker A high-speed, solid-state circuit breaker is capable of interrupting high DC currents without generating an arc, and it is maintenance-free. Both the switch and the tripping unit are solid-state, which meet precise protection requirements. The high-speed, solid-stat... | 10/04/2005 |
| 6922057 | Device to provide a regulated power supply for in-cylinder ionization detection by using a charge pump A charge pump is used to supply current to the ionization detection circuit. To detect in-cylinder ions generated during the combustion process, a DC bias voltage needs to be applied. There are two ways to generate the DC bias: conventional DC power supply (large el... | 07/26/2005 |
| RE38734 | Semiconductor switching apparatus and method of controlling a semiconductor switching element An inductance in a path (R1) from a gate electrode (3G) of a GTO (3) through a gate driver (4) and a node (13) to a cathode electrode (3K) is determined so that a turn-off gain may be not more than 1. At a turn-off, a main c... | 05/17/2005 |
| 6812772 | Method for driving a power semiconductor The integrated gate dual transistor (IGDT) has two controllable gates (G1, G2), a first gate (G1) being provided on the cathode side and being driven via a low-inductance first gate terminal with a first gate current, and a second gate (G2 | 11/02/2004 |
| 6710639 | Emitter turn-off thyristors and their drive circuits A family of emitter turn-off thyristors and their drive circuit comprise a gate turn-on (GTO) thyristor, a first switch, the drain of the first switch being connected to the cathode of the GTO thyristor, and a second switch connected between the gate of the GTO thyr... | 03/23/2004 |
| 6650169 | Gate driver apparatus having an energy recovering circuit A novel gate driver apparatus in which an energy recovery circuitry is incorporated in a square-wave gate driver. The energy recovery circuitry has a first loop circuit for discharging the energy from the gate capacitor to an inductor when the gate driver... | 11/18/2003 |
| 6426666 | Diode-assisted gate turn-off thyristor A gate-controlled switch includes a gate turn-off thyristor in series with a diode. By using the diode in series with the GTO, the switch significantly increases the turn-off voltage that can be used for the current commutation. The unity turn-off gain an... | 07/30/2002 |
| 6423988 | Pressure-contact semiconductor device This invention relates to a pressure-contact type semiconductor device (1) having a ring-shaped gate terminal, and aims at overcoming such a technical problem that a gate current is not uniformly supplied to a semiconductor substrate (4) due to a connecti... | 07/23/2002 |
| 6339231 | Gate commutated turn-off thyristor module A gate terminal plate (1) of a GCT thyristor (90), a connecting substrate (70) of a driving device and a cathode electrode plate (10) are interposed between a set of metal rings (7A) and (7C) fastened to each other with a screw (8). The cathode electrode ... | 01/15/2002 |
| 6275093 | IGBT gate drive circuit with short circuit protection An IGBT gate driver circuit includes means for detecting when the collector-to-emitter voltage (Vce) of a turned-on IGBT, intended to be operated in the saturation region, increases above a preset level, indicative of a fault condition, such as a short ci... | 08/14/2001 |
| 6271708 | Gate circuit In a gate circuit having a turn-off gate circuit composed of: OFF gate power source Eoff of which one terminal is connected to the emitter of semiconductor switching element 81, and switch SWoff that connects the other terminal of OF... | 08/07/2001 |
| 6252451 | Switching circuit A one-way switching circuit of the type including a gate tun-off thyristor biased to be normally on, further includes, between the gate and a supply line, a capacitor and a controllable switch connected in parallel.... | 06/26/2001 |
| 6172552 | FET device for use in solid-state relay In an FET device having a pair of input terminals, a pair of output terminals, a plurality of FETs and driving circuits, the driving circuit has such a circuit structure that source electrodes of the FETs are electrically connected to each other. Each of ... | 01/09/2001 |
| 6163200 | Gate driver device for GTO thyristor In a gate driver device, cathode conductor 2, gate conductor 3, and positive and negative conductors 8 and 9 between the principal turn-on and turn-off capacitors and MOSFET switching elements Q11-Q1i and Q21-Q2j are disposed on a wide plate. A thin insul... | 12/19/2000 |
| 6127746 | Method of controlling the switching DI/DT and DV/DT of a MOS-gated power transistor The switching di/dt and switching dv/dt of a MOS gate controlled ("MOS-gated") power device are controlled by respectively controlling the voltage and current waveforms. Open loop control of the turn-on of the MOS-gated device is provided by coupling a co... | 10/03/2000 |
| 5990724 | Method and a device for detecting and handling short-circuit phenomena for power semiconductor devices of turn-off type connected in series In a method and apparatus used for detecting and handling a short circuit in a circuit having a plurality of power semiconductors connected in series the voltage is divided across the electrodes and each power semiconductor and the magnitude of a small pr... | 11/23/1999 |
| 5986290 | Silicon controlled rectifier with reduced substrate current The invention provides a silicon controlled rectifier having an anode and a cathode and including an NPN transistor and a PNP transistor. The NPN transistor has an emitter coupled to the cathode, a base and a collector. The PNP transistor has a base coupl... | 11/16/1999 |
| 5949273 | Short circuit protection for parallel connected devices A power semiconductor circuit provides a simple gate drive for switch components for the use in parallel-connected half-bridges, taking into consideration a gate voltage limitation to achieve short-circuit resistance. The circuit consists of drive circuit... | 09/07/1999 |
| 5852381 | Turbine engine ignition exciter circuit including low voltage lockout control An improved turbine engine ignition exciter circuit. Energy stored in an exciter tank capacitor is subsequently switched to the load (igniter plug) through a novel thyristor switching device specifically designed for pulse power applications. The switchin... | 12/22/1998 |
| 5847593 | Voltage discharge circuit for a photovoltaic power source A circuit for discharging of a photovoltaic power source has a first and a second terminal and the circuit comprises a discharge circuit which is connected between the first and second terminal of the power source which comprises a controllable current so... | 12/08/1998 |
| 5777506 | Semiconductor switching apparatus and method of controlling a semiconductor switching element An inductance in a path (R1) from a gate electrode (3G) of a GTO (3) through a gate driver (4) and a node (13) to a cathode electrode (3K) is determined so that a turn-off gain may be not more than 1. At a turn-off, a main current (IA) is entir... | 07/07/1998 |
| 5712587 | Apparatus and method for simultaneously deactivating series-connected switching devices An apparatus for use in the simultaneous deactivation of a set of series-connected switching devices includes gate command control logic to generate a gate command signal for application to a selected switching device of the set of series-connected switch... | 01/27/1998 |
| 5699008 | Thyristor controllable by logic signals A thyristor, controllable by logic signals independent of its cathode voltage, includes a thyristor, a PNP transistor between the gate and the anode of the thyristor, and an NPN transistor between the base of the PNP transistor and a terminal connected to... | 12/16/1997 |
| 5684426 | GTO gate driver circuits for snubbered and zero voltage soft switching converters A GTO gate driver circuit includes a GTO; a MOS gate driver; a turn-on rectifier for receiving power from a high voltage isolation transformer; a turn-on capacitor coupled in parallel with the turn-on rectifier; and a turn-on MOSFET having a drain coupled... | 11/04/1997 |
| 5656966 | Turbine engine ignition exciter circuit including low voltage lockout control An improved turbine engine ignition exciter circuit. Energy stored in an exciter tank capacitor is subsequently switched to the load (igniter plug) through a novel thyristor switching device specifically designed for pulse power applications. The switchin... | 08/12/1997 |
| 5629571 | Thyristor load detector A method is described in which load current present in a thyristor device may be detected by monitoring the characteristic voltage found on the gate of the thyristor. Load status information may be used in various ways such as, to turn off the output, to ... | 05/13/1997 |
| 5621257 | Gate drive circuit for voltage-driven type power switching device A gate drive circuit for a voltage-driven type power switching device, including a control device for generating a gate voltage for the voltage-driven type power switching device, and a correction device connected to the control device for receiving the g... | 04/15/1997 |
| 5616970 | Method and circuit arrangement for driving semiconductor switches in a series circuit In a method and a circuit arrangement for driving semiconductor switches in a series circuit, in which a voltage limiting device is assigned to each semiconductor switch, the power losses of the voltage limiting devices are detected by a control equipment... | 04/01/1997 |
| 5596292 | A.C. switch triggered at a predetermined half-period An a.c. switch includes across first and second main terminals a first thyristor disposed in parallel with, but in an opposite direction of, a first diode and in series with a second thyristor disposed in parallel with but in an opposite direction of, a s... | 01/21/1997 |
| 5592118 | Ignition exciter circuit with thyristors having high di/dt and high voltage blockage An improved turbine engine ignition exciter circuit. Energy stored in an exciter tank capacitor is subsequently switched to the load (igniter plug) through a novel thyristor switching device specifically designed for pulse power applications. The switchin... | 01/07/1997 |
| 5534735 | Photo SI thyristor driving circuit and its protection circuit A photo SI thyristor driving circuit which has a good switching characteristic suitable to be used for a photo relay, and a protection circuit therefor for protecting a photo SI thyristor element from being broken down due to a thermal runaway. The photo ... | 07/09/1996 |
