Photocoupler slashes power by 80%

In response to increasing demand for energy efficient devices, Toshiba Electronics has released the industry's lowest power consumption photocoupler.

In response to increasing demand for energy efficient devices, Toshiba Electronics has released the industry's lowest power consumption photocoupler.

The new TLP351 can be used for a wide range of industrial and home appliance applications including industrial inverters, high power type mosfet gate drives, IGBT gate drives and air conditioning inverters.

Housed in an 8-pin DIP, the device is an optically coupled isolator consisting of a light emitting diode and an integrated photodetector.

The photocoupler provides electrical isolation, solving various design issues including the connection of different voltages, elimination of noise, and protection from electrical shock.

The Toshiba TLP351 photocoupler uses a BiCMOS process to reduce the maximum supply current down to 2mA, which is 80% lower than Toshiba's previous generation TLP251 device.

Currently, this is the industry's lowest power consumption level offered in a photocoupler solution.

Because Toshiba's TLP351 features low power consumption, it requires less space for heat dissipation and fewer peripheral components.

By optimising the internal circuit, Toshiba extended the operating temperature range of the TLP351 to -40 to +100C, compared with the TLP251's previous range of -20 to +85C.

The company has also doubled the output current and improved isolation voltage.

The TLP351 is pin compatible with Toshiba's previous generation TLP251 photocoupler, enabling designers to use existing board designs.

The application for the worldwide safety certificate is currently pending.

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