The primary goal of the doctoral thesis was to develop a novel field in power electronics – galvanically isolated impedance-source DC-DC converters (GI ISCs). The doctoral thesis proved that these converters can be characterized by beneficial features of both the current-source and voltage-source converters. Therefore, the GI ISCs are a good electric energy conversion alternative to the existing current-source and voltage-source converters.
The supervisor of the doctoral thesis, Dmitri Vinnikov, Lead Research Scientist at the TUT Faculty of Power Engineering, said, ” We found that the resonant switching along with synchronous rectification and use of wide bandgap semiconductors can significantly improve the efficiency of the GI ISCs limited by the additional components of the Impedance-Source-Network used so far. Moreover, cascading of converters can improve DC voltage gain and redundancy of the whole system.”
This work has also a substantial practical value since it introduces three examples of the application of GI ISCs (intended for zero energy buildings):
- high performance PV microconverter with an ultra-wide input voltage range, which can withstand even complicated cases of partial shading;
- low-cost PV microconverter based on the transformer-based singleswitch GI ISC topology;
- novel galvanically isolated power conditioning unit for permanent magnet synchronous generator based wind turbines.
“The theoretical and practical results of the doctoral thesis contribute substantially to the further development of the field of the GI ISCs, advertise the benefits of the GI ISC technology and make it attractive for the industry,” Dmitri Vinnikov adds.
The supervisor of the doctoral thesis was Lead Research Scientist Dmitri Vinnikov (TUT), the co-supervisors were Oleksandr Husev (TUT) and Sergii Ivanets (Chernihiv National University of Technology).
The opponents were Professor Ralph Kennel (Technical University of Munich) and Haitham Abu-Rub (Texas A&M University of Qatar, Qatar).
The doctoral thesis has been published in the digital collection of TUT library: http://digi.lib.ttu.ee/i/?3969
Additional information: Lead Research Scientist Dmitri Vinnikov, dmitri.vinnikov@ttu.ee