Abstract：With the increasing demands of flexible high-voltage DC transmission and solid-state high-voltage DC switch technologies, the series connection of IGBTs gets more and more attentions. This paper reviews various methods of dynamic voltage balancing for series-connected IGBTs, and classifies the gate-control methods into three categories, voltage clamping, gate synchronization and voltage control. With brief analysis and comparison of these methods, it is indicated that multiple factors, including performance, loss, size and reliability, must be considered and complementary advantages of more than one methods should be utilized to realize the balance of dynamic voltages of IGBTs in series connection.
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2013, Vol. 28 
