Systems and methods for gate driver with field-adjustable UVLO
AssigneeMaxim Integrated Products, Inc.
InventorArman Hematy
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Systems and methods for gate driver with field-adjustable undervoltage lockout (UVLO) are disclosed. A gate driver system comprises a control circuit and a driver circuit. The driver circuit incorporates a field-adjustable UVLO, a control logic, and an inverter. The level of the field-adjustable UVLO is adjustable by an external circuit, which can be a resistor based voltage divider. By setting the UVLO level externally adjustable and by moving a reference ground to the external voltage divider, the gate driver system is able to implement gate control for various load without needing extra ground pin.
Claims20
A gate driver system comprising:
- a control circuit outputs a control signal;
- an external circuit comprising a reference ground, the external circuit outputs an external voltage;
- and
- a driver circuit couples to the control circuit, the driver circuit comprising:
- an adjustable undervoltage lockout (UVLO) coupled to the external circuit for providing the reference ground to the driver circuit, the adjustable UVLO receives the external voltage and a supply voltage to generate an UVLO output signal indicating a status of supply voltage, the adjustable UVLO has a trigger point adjustably determined by the external voltage;
- a logic circuit receives the control signal and the adjustable UVLO output signal to generate a logic output signal;
- an inverter receives the logic output signal to generate a driver output for gate control, in response to the adjustable UVLO being triggered, the logic circuit decouples communication between the control signal and the driver output.
A gate driver circuit comprising:
- a voltage divider coupled to a supply voltage to provide an external voltage with reference to a reference ground;
- an adjustable undervoltage lockout (UVLO) coupled to the voltage divider for providing the reference ground to a driver circuit, the adjustable UVLO receives the supply voltage and the external voltage, the adjustable UVLO generates an UVLO output signal indicating a status of the supply voltage, the adjustable UVLO has a trigger point adjustably determined by the external voltage;
- a logic circuit receiving a control signal and the UVLO output signal to generate a logic output signal;
- and
- an inverter receiving the logic output signal to generate a driver output for gate control, in response to the adjustable UVLO being triggered, the logic circuit disables communication between the control signal and the driver output.
A method for gate driving, the method comprising:
- receiving, at an adjustable undervoltage lockout (UVLO), an external voltage and a supply voltage referenced to a reference ground external to the adjustable UVLO;
- generating, by the adjustable UVLO, an UVLO output signal indicating a status of the supply voltage, the external voltage is adjustable to determine a trigger point of the adjustable UVLO;
- receiving, at a logic circuit, a control signal and the UVLO output signal to generate a logic output signal;
- and
- receiving, at an inverter, the logic output signal to generate a driver output for gate control, in response to the adjustable UVLO being triggered, the logic circuit decouples communication between the control signal and the driver output.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.