Opportunity
The increasing application of converters across various technological fields has created a significant demand for efficient and comprehensive circuit analysis methods to design high-performance converter circuits. Existing methodologies are inadequate. Manual analysis is labor-intensive, time-consuming, and prone to incompleteness, failing to explore the full design space. While automated analysis techniques exist, they often suffer from similar limitations: their analysis is not exhaustive, they may generate topologies that still require substantial human interpretation and verification, and they frequently fail to meet the practical requirements of modern, complex multi-port converter design. This gap highlights a critical need for a systematic, automated, and thorough approach to topology derivation and analysis, particularly for single-inductor multi-port converters, which are essential in advanced power electronics applications like renewable energy systems and electric vehicles.
Technology
This patent presents an innovative, graph theory-based method for the systematic derivation and analysis of single-inductor multi-port converter circuit topologies. The core innovation lies in modeling the converter circuit as a graph and its corresponding adjacency matrix. The method begins by determining candidate node counts (N) for a circuit defined by one inductor, NS switches, and NP ports. For each N, it algorithmically generates the complete set of possible N-order candidate adjacency matrices. Each matrix uniquely represents a potential circuit topology, where rows/columns correspond to nodes and non-zero elements represent the specific connections of the inductor, switches, and ports. The technology then performs an automated, in-depth steady-state analysis on each candidate topology. This involves configuring ports as inputs/outputs, enumerating all possible switch states (2^NS modes), and using fundamental loop and cut-set matrices to derive modal equations (KCL, KVL, switch equations) for each state. It filters these to identify valid switching modes, formulates volt-second balance and output equations, and solves for the complete steady-state characteristics (voltages, currents, gains, stresses). Finally, it applies a set of topology validity conditions—including inductor constraints, ideal switch constraints, ideal port constraints, and port voltage independent adjustability—to each analyzed topology. This process automatically filters the initial set of all possible topologies to yield only the functionally valid and practical single-inductor multi-port converter circuits.
Advantages
- Provides a systematic and exhaustive method for deriving all possible circuit topologies from a given set of discrete components (one inductor, multiple switches, multiple ports).
- Significantly improves analysis efficiency and reduces human labor compared to manual or semi-automated methods.
- Integrates topology derivation with detailed steady-state performance analysis (e.g., voltage gain, device stress), offering practical insights directly during the design phase.
- Automates the validation process using clearly defined circuit-theoretic constraints, ensuring the identified topologies are functionally viable.
- Discovers novel, non-obvious converter topologies beyond those found in existing literature, expanding the designer's toolkit.
- The method is implementable via computer programs/electronic devices, enabling high-speed automated topology screening and design.
Applications
- Automated design software for power electronics, specifically for DC-DC converters.
- Research and development of novel multi-port converter topologies for advanced applications.
- Power management system design in renewable energy integration (e.g., solar, wind with storage).
- On-board power systems and battery management in electric vehicles (EVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs).
- Design of power converters for aerospace, telecommunications, and industrial power supplies.
- Educational tools for teaching power electronics and circuit theory concepts.
