• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.58-67
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• 2019

This study presents a new portable eight-output light emitting diode (LED) driver. The eight output-channels are divided into two equal groups, and their output powers can be controlled individually by three active switches. In addition, a simple capacitor-based passive current balancing circuit (CBC) is employed in each port to guarantee that the currents of the four LEDs are the same. When compared with the conventionally used separate two-output isolated converters, the proposed one uses one less active switch. Moreover, zero-voltage-switching (ZVS) is achieved, which improves the power efficiency of the driver. Finally, a highly compact prototype is built, which can reach an efficiency of 94.6%.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.1051-1066
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• 2018

This study presents a novel step-up switched capacitor multilevel inverter (SCMLI) structure. The proposed structure comprises 2 unequal DC voltage sources, 4 capacitors, and 14 unidirectional power switches. It can synthesize 21 output voltage levels. The important features of the proposed topology are its self-voltage boosting and inherent capacitor voltage balancing capabilities. Furthermore, a cascaded structure of the proposed SCMLI with an asymmetric DC voltage source configuration is presented. The proposed topology and its cascaded structure are compared with conventional and other recently developed topologies in terms of different aspects, such as the required components to produce a specific number of output voltage levels, the total standing voltage (TSV) and peak inverse voltage of the structure, and the maximum number of switches in the conducting path. Furthermore, a cost function is developed to verify the cost-effectiveness of the proposed topology with respect to other topologies. The TSV of the proposed topology is significantly lower than those of other topologies. Moreover, the developed topology is cost-effective compared with other topologies. A detailed operating principle, power loss analysis, and selection procedure for switched capacitors are presented for the proposed SCMLI structure. Extensive simulation and experimental studies of a 21-level inverter structure prove the effectiveness and merits of the proposed SCMLI.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.714-726
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• 2019

This paper proposes a hybrid-boost Modular Multilevel Converter (MMC) for the Medium-Voltage (MV) Variable Speed Drives (VSDs) employed in subsea applications, such as oil and gas recovery. In the presented architecture, a hybrid-boost MMC with a reduced number of semiconductor devices driving a multiphase Induction Machine (IM) is investigated. The stepped output voltage generated by the MMC reduces or eliminates the filtering requirements. Moreover, the boosting capability of the proposed architecture eliminates the need for bulky low-frequency transformers at the converter output terminals. A detailed illustration of the hybrid-boost MMC operation, the expected limitations/constraints, and the voltage balancing technique are presented. A simulation model of the proposed MV hybrid-boost MMC-based five-phase IM drive has been built to investigate the system performance. Finally, a downscaled prototype has been constructed for experimental verification.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics and Information Engineers
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• v.52 no.5
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• pp.58-65
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• 2015

This paper presents the design of an implantable stimulation IC intended for neural prosthetic devices using $0.18-{\mu}m$ standard CMOS technology. The proposed single-channel biphasic current stimulator prototype is designed to deliver up to 1 mA of current to the tissue-equivalent $10-k{\Omega}$ load using 12.8-V supply voltage. To utilize only low-voltage standard CMOS transistors in the design, transistor stacking with dynamic gate biasing technique is used for reliable operation at high-voltage. In addition, active charge balancing circuit is used to maintain zero net charge at the stimulation site over the complete stimulation cycle. The area of the total stimulator IC consisting of DAC, current stimulation output driver, level-shifters, digital logic, and active charge balancer is $0.13mm^2$ and is suitable to be applied for multi-channel neural prosthetic devices.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.9-13
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• 2010

This paper proposes an input-series-output-parallel connected ZVS full bridge converter with interleaved control for photovoltaic power conditioning systems (PV PCS). The input-series connection enables a fully modular power-system architecture, where low voltage and standard power modules can be connected in any combination at the input and/or at the output, to realize any given specifications. Further, the input-series connection enables the use of low-voltage MOSFETs that are optimized for a very low RDSON, thus, resulting in lower conduction losses. The system costs decrease due to the reduced current, and the volumes of the output filters due to the interleaving technique. A topology for a photovoltaic (PV) dc/dc converter that can dramatically reduce the power rating and increase the efficiency of a PV system by analyzing the PV module characteristics is proposed. The control scheme, consisting of an output voltage loop, a current loop and input voltage balancing loops, is proposed to achieve input voltage sharing and output current sharing. The total PV system is implemented for a 10-kW PV power conditioning system (PCS). This system has a dc/dc converter with a 3.6-kW power rating. It is only one-third of the total PV PCS power. A 3.6-kW prototype PV dc/dc converter is introduced to experimentally verify the proposed topology. In addition, experimental results show that the proposed topology exhibits good performance.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.519-527
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• 2012

A high step-down multiple-output LED driver is proposed in this paper. Firstly, the derivation of the driver with dual-output is presented and its operation principle and steady state performance are analyzed in detail. Secondly, a high step-down N-channel LED driver is proposed and its current auto-balance characteristic and step-down ratio are analyzed. Finally, an experimental prototype is built and the experimental results are given. The theoretical analysis and experimental results show that the proposed driver has the following virtues: First, if load balancing is achieved, the voltage gain is 1/N that of a Buck driver, where N is the number of channels. Second, each output automatically has an equal output current, without requiring more current close-loop control circuits than a Buck driver. Last, the voltage stresses of the switches and diodes are lower than those of a Buck driver, meaning that lower voltage switches and diodes can be used, and a higher efficiency can be expected.

• Proceedings of the KIPE Conference
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• 2017.07a
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• pp.347-348
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• 2017

This paper presents a new current balancing operation for LED using double-step-down dc-dc converter. The two output currents of the proposed converter can be balanced by charge balance condition although the two output resistances are different. In addition, voltage stresses of the switches of the proposed converter are lower than those of interleaved buck converter. To verify the operation of the proposed converter, simulation program is used.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.861-871
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• 2016

With high penetration of renewable energies, power electronic transformers (PETs) will be one of the most important infrastructures in the future power delivery and management system. In this study, an isolated bidirectional modular multilevel DC/DC converter is proposed for PET applications. A modular multilevel structure is adopted as switching valves to sustain medium voltages to achieve modular design and high reliability. Only one high-frequency transformer is used in the proposed converter, which significantly simplifies the circuit and galvanic insulation design. A dual-phase-shift modulation strategy is proposed to regulate the output power and achieve a simple voltage balancing control. A down-scaled (2 kW/20 kHz) prototype is constructed to demonstrate the proposed converter and verify the control strategy. The experimental results comply with the theoretical analysis well, with the highest power efficiency reaching 97.6%.

• Proceedings of the KIPE Conference
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• 2007.07a
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• pp.241-243
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• 2007

Two-stage charge equalization scheme for HEV lithium-ion battery string is proposed with the optimal power rating design rule in this paper, where in the first stage the over charged energy of higher voltage cells is drawn out to the single common output capacitor and then, that discharged energy is recovered into the overall battery stack in the second stage. To achieve charge equalization of sort, the conventional flyback DC/DC converters of low power and minimized size are employed. The industrial sample employing both the proposed two-stage cell balancing scheme and the optimal power rating design rule shows good cell balancing performance with reduced size as well as low voltage stresses of the electronic devices.

• Proceedings of the KIPE Conference
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• 2012.07a
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• pp.195-196
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• 2012

In recent years, in an effort to improve the efficiency and the power density of the front-end power factor correction(PFC), the interleaving of multiple converter is employed. The conventional interleaved continuous conduction mode(CCM) boost PFC converter requires input and output voltage sensing and three current sensing to obtain current balancing between modules. In this paper, the interleaved CCM PFC converter based on modulated carrier control is proposed. With the proposed method, two phase interleaved PFC can be realized simply without line voltage sensing resistor and can achieve current balancing without additional current sensing resistor on common return path. The simulation studies are carried out to verify the effectiveness of the proposed control scheme.