• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.345-352
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• 2017

In this paper, a non-dissipative snubber for reducing the switching losses in the step down converter is proposed. The conventional step down converter, e.g., buck converter, suffers from serious switching losses and consequentially heat generation because of its hard switching. Thus, it is unsuitable for high switching frequency operation. Reduction of the reactive components' size, such as an output inductor and capacitor, is difficult. The proposed snubber can slow down the increasing current slopes and switch voltage at turn-on and turn-off transients, thereby significantly reducing the switching loses. Additionally, the slowly increasing current during switch turn-on transition, can effectively solve the output rectifier diode reverse recovery problem. Therefore, the proposed non-dissipative snubber not only leads to the efficiency of converter operation at high switching frequency but also reduces the reactive components size in proportion to the switching frequency. To confirm the validity of the proposed circuit, theoretical analysis and experimental results from a 150 W, 1 MHz prototype are presented.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.23-30
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• 2014

This paper proposes a single power-conversion ac-dc converter with a dc-link capacitor-less and high power factor. The proposed converter is derived by integrating a full-bridge diode rectifier and a series-resonant active-clamp dc-dc converter. To obtain a high power factor without a power factor correction circuit, this paper proposes a suitable control algorithm for the proposed converter. The proposed converter provides single power-conversion by using the proposed control algorithm for both power factor correction and output control. Also, the active-clamp circuit clamps the surge voltage of switches and recycles the energy stored in the leakage inductance of the transformer. Moreover, it provides zero-voltage turn-on switching of the switches. Also, a series-resonant circuit of the output-voltage doubler removes the reverse-recovery problem of the output diodes. The proposed converter provides maximum power factor of 0.995 and maximum efficiency of 95.1% at the full-load. The operation principle of the converter is analyzed and verified. Experimental results for a 400W ac-dc converter at a constant switching frequency of 50kHz are obtained to show the performance of the proposed converter.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.579-589
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• 2017

In this study a new high step-up dc-dc converter is presented. The operation of the proposed converter is based on the capacitor switching and coupled inductor with a single active power switch in its structure. A passive voltage clamp circuit with two capacitors and two diodes is used in the proposed converter for elevating the converter's voltage gain with the recovered energy of the leakage inductor, and for lowering the voltage stress on the power switch. A switch with a low $R_{DS}$ (on) can be adopted to reduce conduction losses. In the generalized mode of the proposed converter, to reach a desired voltage gain, capacitor stages with parallel charge and series discharge techniques are extended from both sides of secondary side of the coupled inductor. The proposed converter has the ability to alleviate the reverse recovery problem of diodes with circuit parameters. The operating principle and steady-states analyses are discussed in detail. A 40W prototype of the proposed converter is implemented in the laboratory to verify its operation.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.353-362
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• 2019

To address the problem of circulating current loss in the traditional zero-current switching (ZCS) full-bridge (FB) DC/DC converter, a ZCS FB DC/DC converter topology and modulation strategy is proposed in this paper. The strategy can achieve ZCS turn on and zero-voltage and zero-current switching (ZVZCS) turn off for the primary switches and realize ZVZCS turn on and zero-voltage switching (ZVS) turn off for the auxiliary switches. Moreover, its resonant circuit power is small. Compared with the traditional phase shift full-bridge converter, the new converter decreases circulating current loss and does not increase the current stress of the primary switches and the voltage stress of the rectifier diodes. The diodes turn off naturally when the current decreases to zero. Thus, neither reverse recovery current nor loss on diodes occurs. In this paper, we analyzed the operating principle, steady-state characteristics and soft-switching conditions and range of the converter in detail. A 740 V/1 kW, 100 kHz experimental prototype was established, verifying the effectiveness of the converter through experimental results.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.401-408
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• 2016

Desalination is getting more attention as an alternative to solve a global water shortage problem in the future. Especially, a desalination technology is being expected as a new growth engine of Korea's overseas plant business besides one of the solutions of domestic water shortage problem. In the past, a thermal evaporation technology was a predominant method in desalination market, but more than 75% of the current market is hold by a membrane-based reverse osmosis technology because of its lower energy consumption rate for desalination. In the future, it is expected to have more energy efficient desalination process. Accordingly, various processes are being developed to further enhance the desalination energy efficiency. One of the promising technologies is a desalination process combined with Pressure Retarded Osmosis (PRO) process. The PRO technology is able to generate energy by using osmotic pressure of seawater or desalination brine. And the other benefits are that it has no emission of $CO_2$ and the limited impact of external environmental factors. However, it is not commercialized yet because a high-performance PRO membrane and module, and a PRO system optimization technology is not sufficiently developed. In this paper, the recent research direction and progress of the SWRO-PRO hybrid desalination was discussed regarding a PRO membrane and module, an energy recovery system, pre-treatment and system optimization technologies, and so on.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.143-151
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• 2018

In this paper, a novel hybrid configuration combining a phase-shift full-bridge (PSFB) and a half-bridge resonant LLC converter is proposed for the On-Board Charger of Electric Vehicles (EVs). In the proposed converter, the PSFB converter shares the lagging-leg switches with half-bridge resonant converter to achieve the wide ZVS range for the switches and to improve the efficiency. The output voltage is modulated by the effective-duty-cycle of the PSFB converter. The proposed converter employs an active reset circuit composed of an active switch and a diode for the transformer which makes it possible to achieve zero circulating current and the soft switching characteristic of the primary switches and rectifier diodes regardless of the load, thereby making the converter highly efficient and eliminating the reverse recovery problem of the diodes. In addition an optimal power sharing strategy is proposed to meet the specification of the charger and to optimize the efficiency of the converter. The operation principle the proposed converter and design considerations for high efficiency are presented. A 6.6 kW prototype converter is fabricated and tested to evaluate its performance at different conditions. The peak efficiency achieved with the proposed converter is 97.7%.

• Journal of IKEEE
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.962-970
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• 2019

In this paper, the non-isolation, high-efficiency and high-voltage-output DC-DC converter using the self-driven synchronous switch is proposed. The proposed converter achieves high-voltage-output by applying a tapped inductor to the conventional boost DC-DC converter structure, and it reduces the voltage stress of main switch applying the lossless capacitor-diode (LCD) snubber to the switch. And the proposed converter applies the synchronous switch instead of the diode to the output part, and thus it resolves the reverse recovery problem and achieves high-efficiency. The synchronous switch of proposed converter uses the self-driven method and has a simple structure. In this paper, the operation principle of proposed converter is explained, and then, a design example of the converter prototype is presented. And the characteristics of the proposed converter are shown through experimental results of the prototype made with the designed circuit parameters.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.378-385
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• 2021

The production of plum jangachi requires the cleaning of plums, immersion in saltwater, separation of seed and pulp, removal of impurities, and addition of sugar. In most farms, the separation of plum seed and pulp is carried out manually, requiring considerable labor, which is why plum jangachi is expensive. To solve this problem, this study designed and manufactured automatic, semi-automatic plum seed and pulp separators. During the design process, the characteristics were compared, and the machine power was determined through on-site test after manufacture. As a result, automatic machines used plums 180° arrayed and six reverse-edged blades, semi-automated plums 180° arrayed, and six blades, each with a 68% and 57% pulp recovery rate and a machine power of 80 kg/h and 62 kg/h respectively. Overall, the mechanization of plum processed food will reduce labor and increase the market value of plums compared to the previous method.