Raytheon Company of Waltham, MA, USA says that its technology facility in Glenrothes, Scotland, UK has successfully tested silicon carbide (SiC) mixed-signal devices at temperatures up to 400°C.
“Raytheon UK’s aim is to offer design and manufacturing services for customized mixed-signal integrated circuits in silicon carbide, which operate in harsh, long-term environments,” says Neil MacTavish, semiconductor business development executive for Raytheon UK. “Raytheon’s leadership is based on advanced manufacturing processes and technology, which has the potential to be a game changer for energy, sustainability and green-related applications in both commercial and military domains,” he reckons.
High-temperature integrated circuits are desirable in applications such as aero engines, monitoring engine performance in the heart of the engine, or in deep hydrocarbon and geothermal drilling applications where operation interruption to replace sensor technology is a constant cost pressure. Raytheon says that, as SiC power-discrete devices proliferate, there is a growing need for more control functions capable of operating in the same temperature and power management conditions, without heat dissipation constraints.
The firm says the test results show that SiC complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS), fabricated on 4H SiC wafers, can be used to create the essential circuit building blocks required for logic and analog functions together on the same chip, which can operate in the harsh environments that users demand.
