• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• 2014.10a
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• pp.278-281
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• 2014

This paper presents the performance comparison of three types of full-wave rectifiers for vibration energy harvesting. The first rectifier is consisted of two active diodes and two MOSFETs, and the comparators of the active diodes are powered from the output of the rectifier. The second one is a 2-stage full-wave rectifier. It comprises the basic rectifier consisted of four MOSFETs and an active diode. The comparator is also powered from the output of the rectifier. The third one is an input powered rectifier. It has the same structure as the second rectifier, but the comparator is powered from the input of the rectifier. These rectifiers have been designed using a 0.35um CMOS process and their performances have been compared through simulations. In terms of efficiency, the first rectifier shows the best performance at heavy loads, but the second one is suitable at light loads. When the power consumption during absence of vibration is more important than efficiency, the input-powered rectifier is proper.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.56 no.5
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• pp.938-943
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• 2007

In this paper, we show that, in case of piezoelectric micropower generator, just replacing Schottky diodes in the bridge rectifier with ultra-low reverse leakage current diodes improves the mechanical-to-electrical energy conversion efficiency by more than 100%. Experimental and PSPICE simulation results show that, due to the ultra-low leakage current, the charging speed of the circuit employing PAD1 is higher than that of the circuit employing Schottky diodes and the saturation voltage of the circuit employing PAD1 is also higher. This study suggests that , when the internal impedance of source is very large (a few tens of $M{\Omega}$) such that maximum charging current is a few microamperes or less, in order to realize literally the energy scavenging system, ultra-low reverse leakage current diodes should be used for efficient energy conversion. Since low-level vibration is ubiquitous in the environment ranging from human movement to large infrastructures and the mechanical-to-electrical energy conversion efficiency is much more critical for use of these vibrations, we believe that the improvement in the efficiency using ultra-low leakage diodes, as found in this work, will widen greatly the application of piezoelectric micropower generator.

• Proceedings of the KIPE Conference
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• 2000.07a
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• pp.266-269
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• 2000

This paper presents a novel single-stage unity power factor converter which features the reduced switching losses by zero-voltage switching and zero-current switching (ZVZCS). Hence the turn-on and turn-off losses of switches are sufficiently reduced. And the reduced conduction losses are achieved by the elimination of one leg of front-end rectifier. And low on-resistance MOSFETs (Synchronous Rectifier) are used in the rectifier at the secondary side of high frequency transformer instead of diodes. Theoretical analysis simulated results of a AC to DC 150W(5V, 30A) converter are presented.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.815-826
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• 2014

An improved bridgeless interleaved boost power factor correction (PFC) rectifier to improve power efficiency and component utilization is proposed in this study. With combined conventional bridgeless PFC circuit and interleaved technology, the proposed rectifier consists of two interleaved and magnetic inter-coupling boost bridgeless converter cells. Each cell operates alternatively in the critical conduction mode, which can achieve the soft-switching characteristics of the switches and increase power capacity. Auxiliary blocking diodes are employed to eliminate undesired circulating loops and reduce current-sensing noise, which are among the serious drawbacks of a dual-boost PFC rectifier. Magnetic component utilization is improved by symmetrically coupling two inductors on a unique core, which can achieve independence from each other based on the auxiliary diodes. Through the interleaved approach, each switch can operate in the whole line cycle. A simple control scheme is employed in the circuit by using a conventional interleaved controller. The operation principle and theoretical analysis of the converter are presented. A 600 W experimental prototype is built to verify the theoretical analysis and feasibility of the proposed rectifier. System efficiency reaches 97.3% with low total harmonic distortion at full load.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.288-295
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• 2019

Rectifiers are widely used in industrial applications. Although detailed models of rectifiers are usually used to evaluate their performance, they are complex and time-consuming. Therefore, the Average Value Model (AVM) has been introduced to meet the demand for a simple and accurate model. This type of rectifier modeling can be used to simplify the simulations of large systems. The AVM of diode rectifiers has been an area of interest for many electrical engineers. However, healthy diode rectifiers are only considered for average value modeling. By contrast, faults occur frequently on diodes, which eventually cause the diodes to open-circuit. Therefore, it is essential to model bridge rectifiers under this faulty condition. Indeed, conventional AVMs are not appropriate or accurate for faulty rectifiers. In addition, they are significantly different in modeling. In this paper, a novel application of the parametric average value of a three-phase line-commutated rectifier is proposed in which one diode of the rectifier is considered open-circuited. In order to evaluate the proposed AVM, it is compared with experimental and simulation results for the application of a brushless synchronous generator field. The results clearly demonstrate the accuracy of the proposed model.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.621-633
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• 2015

This paper proposes the analysis and design of a DC-side symmetrical zero-current-switching (ZCS) Class-D current-source driven resonant rectifier to improve the low power-factor and high line current harmonic distortion of lighting applications. An analysis of the junction capacitance effect of Class-D ZCS rectifier diodes, which has a significant impact on line current harmonic distortion, is discussed in this paper. The design procedure is based on the principle of the symmetrical Class-D ZCS rectifier, which ensures more accurate results and provides a more systematic and feasible analysis methodology. Improvement in the power quality is achieved by using the output characteristics of the DC-side Class-D ZCS rectifier, which is inserted between the front-end bridge-rectifier and the bulk-filter capacitor. By using this symmetrical topology, the conduction angle of the bridge-rectifier diode current is increased and the low line harmonic distortion and power-factor near unity were naturally achieved. The peak and ripple values of the line current are also reduced, which allows for a reduced filter-inductor volume of the electromagnetic interference (EMI) filter. In addition, low-cost standard-recovery diodes can be employed as a bridge-rectifier. The validity of the theoretical analysis is confirmed by simulation and experimental results.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.10 no.6
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• pp.598-609
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• 2005

Conventional phase shift full bridge (PSFB) converter has serious voltage oscillation problem across the secondary rectifier diodes, which would require the dissipate snubber circuit, thus degrades the overall efficiency. To overcome this problem a new simple voltage oscillation reduction technique (VORT) which effectively reduce the voltage oscillation of the secondary rectifier diodes for phase shift full bridge converter is proposed. Therefore, no dissipate snubber for rectifier diodes is needed. In addition, since it has wide zero voltage switching (ZVS) range, high efficiency can be achieved. Operational principle, analysis of voltage oscillation, and design consideration are presented compare with that of the conventional PSFB converter. To confirm the validity of the proposed VORT, experimental results from a 420W prototype are presented.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.406-410
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• 2019

Three-level (3L) DC-DC converters are appropriate for high-input-voltage applications. Although the voltage stress of TL converter switches can be reduced to half of the input voltage, the primary side has a large circulating current, which degrades efficiency. In this study, a dual half-bridge cascaded TL converter is presented to reduce this circulating current and thus decrease the conduction loss of the primary circuit. Moreover, the proposed converter can reduce the voltage stress of rectifier diodes, thereby reducing their conduction loss. Therefore, efficiency can be improved by reducing the conduction loss of the primary circuit and rectifier diodes.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.14 no.6
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• pp.1224-1232
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• 2014

A full-bridge secondary dual-resonant DC-DC converter using the asymmetrical pulse-width modulated (APWM) strategy is proposed in this paper. The proposed converter achieves zero-voltage switching for the power switches and zero-current switching for the rectifier diodes in the whole load range without the help of any auxiliary circuit. Given the use of the APWM strategy, a circulating current that exists in a traditional phase-shift full-bridge converter is eliminated. The voltage stress of secondary rectifier diodes in the proposed converter is also clamped to the output voltage. Thus, the existing voltage oscillation of diodes in traditional PSFB converters is eliminated. This paper presents the circuit configuration of the proposed converter and analyzes its operating principle. Experimental results of a 1 kW 385 V/48 V prototype are presented to verify the analysis results of the proposed converter.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.1226-1235
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• 2016

For wearable health monitoring systems, a fundamental problem is the limited space for storing energy, which can be translated into a short operational life. In this paper, a highly efficient active voltage doubling rectifier with a wide input range for micro-piezoelectric energy harvesting systems is proposed. To obtain a higher output voltage, the Dickson charge pump topology is chosen in this design. By replacing the passive diodes with unbalanced-biased comparator-controlled active counterparts, the proposed rectifier minimizes the voltage losses along the conduction path and solves the reverse leakage problem caused by conventional comparator-controlled active diodes. To improve the rectifier input voltage sensitivity and decrease the minimum operational input voltage, two low power common-gate comparators are introduced in the proposed design. To keep the comparator from oscillating, a positive feedback loop formed by the capacitor C is added to it. Based on the SMIC 0.18-μm standard CMOS process, the proposed rectifier is simulated and implemented. The area of the whole chip is 0.91×0.97 mm², while the rectifier core occupies only 13% of this area. The measured results show that the proposed rectifier can operate properly with input amplitudes ranging from 0.2 to 1.0V and with frequencies ranging from 20 to 3000 Hz. The proposed rectifier can achieve a 92.5% power conversion efficiency (PCE) with input amplitudes equal to 0.6 V at 200 Hz. The voltage conversion efficiency (VCE) is around 93% for input amplitudes greater than 0.3 V and load resistances larger than 20kΩ.