What are the special requirements for ESD protection of 10 Gigabit ports on data center switches?

Data center switches with 10 Gigabit (10GBase-T) ports have signal rates up to 500MHz, placing extremely stringent requirements on the parasitic capacitance of ESD devices, requiring <0.3pF to maintain a -3dB bandwidth >1GHz, while also meeting IEC61000-4-2 Class 4 ±8kV contact discharge. The solution uses a YENTE Electronics ESD TLC5V0D8B ultra-low capacitance TVS (Vrwm=5V, typical junction capacitance 0.1pF@1MHz, clamping voltage 9.8V, response time <1ns) connected in parallel to the differential line to ground. This device has a DFN1006 package and a parasitic inductance <0.3nH. Combined with a CMZ2012A-900T common-mode inductor (90Ω@100MHz) to suppress common-mode transients, the measured 10G port ESD test showed an eye diagram template height margin >30% and jitter <1ps, fully meeting the IEEE802.3an standard.