Cryogenic Cermic Multilayer Capacitors for Power Electronics

Recent advances in the areas of high temperature superconductors and low temperature MOSFET devices have opened the door to the possibility of developing highly efficient low-temperature power electronics. The most commonly used high-efficiency capacitors are based on high dielectric constant (K ∼ 1000-4000) barium titanate doped to yield and X7R temperature dependence (±15% change in capacitance from -55 deg. C to 125 deg. C); however, below their minimum use temperature the capacitance drops-off quickly leading to a low volumetric efficiency and high temperature coefficient of capacitance (TCC) at cryogenic temperatures.A series of low temperature materials with moderate to high dielectric constants have been specifically developed for low temperature operation (below 80K). The capacitors fall into three main categories: low TCC, high volumetric efficiency, and energy storage. In the low TCC category, co-fired multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) were fabricated with capacitance values up to 62nF at 30K, TCCs from 0.9 to 2% below 80K, and losses on the order of 0.0001. In the high volumetric efficiency category, dielectrics with permittivities ranging from 1,000 to 30,000 were demonstrated