Fast Electric Vehicle (EV) chargers are necessary to reach the goal of reducing charging times and, consequently, to promote continuous EV adoption. However, minimizing the degradation of the EV battery is correspondingly important, which requires the design of fast EV chargers with low ripple or ripple-free current as a vital contribution to reduce internal heating and stress of the EV battery and improve its lifetime. This paper proposes a modular multi-output DC-DC converter operating in interleaved-based control and with ripple-free operation for a wide output EV battery voltage range. The results were obtained through simulations by considering 400 V and 800 V EV battery systems, and the individual power of each DC-DC of 50 kW. The results show the modularity of the DC-DC converter without the need for carrier synchronization and an analysis of efficiency estimation for different scenarios of power operation (maximum of 1.5 MW).

Voltage multiplier circuits play a crucial role in high-voltage DC power supplies. This paper proposes a bipolar hybrid symmetrical Cockcroft-Walton voltage multiplier for DC high-voltage applications. It consists in the connection of a positive and negative symmetrical voltage multiplier and a shared diode bridge. The proposed topology combines the advantages of the most common symmetrical voltage multipliers, resulting in a smaller and better-regulated output voltage drop, as well as reduced high-voltage isolation requirements and component count. Additionally, it does not require a center-tapped high-voltage transformer, reducing the system’s complexity. It fills the gap in the general framework of voltage multipliers and their respective bipolar topologies. The feasibility of the system has been numerically validated, and the performance of the proposed topology has been verified.

This paper presents a novel cascaded H-bridge converter based on interleaved full-bridge submodules, which offers significantly improved scalability in current ratings compared to traditional cascaded H-bridge configuration. The proposed design enables the use of low-cost, low-current power switches, reducing dependency on the larger and more expensive switches typically required in conventional systems. A key advantage of the interleaved configuration is its ability to virtually increase the number of output voltage levels by interleaving the operation of its submodules. This approach allows the system to replicate the benefits of traditional cascaded H-bridge converters, such as improved waveform quality and reduced harmonic distortion, even in low-voltage, high-power applications, without requiring additional hardware. A tailored modulation scheme is developed for the proposed interleaved architecture and is thoroughly explained in the paper. Additionally, a comprehensive comparative analysis is conducted, evaluating the proposed topology against the conventional configuration in terms of the number of output voltage levels and harmonic content in the output voltage and current, while maintaining a fixed number of submodules. Experimental results validate the performance and feasibility of the proposed interleaved converter and its associated modulation strategy. Although the study focuses on a single-phase implementation, the approach can be seamlessly extended to three-phase systems with minimal modifications.

Bipolar dc microgrids have been increasingly adopted in different applications due to their versatility in scaling to higher power levels while maintaining the same safety requirements as lower voltage unipolar ones. On the other hand, power imbalance, commonly faced in bipolar systems, can lead to undesirable voltage deviations that may trigger protection devices, cause corrosion, and increase risks of electric shock. To address this issue, several voltage balancing solutions have been proposed, including self-balancing dc-dc converters, and others active balancers. Both approaches are different in terms of hardware implementation, efficiency, and complexity. In this paper, a two-switch buck/boost voltage balancer and a self-balanced current-fed dual active bridge (CF-DAB) converter are experimentally compared for applications in bipolar dc microgrids. Experimental results are presented using a 5-kW prototype. The results demonstrate that both solutions offer different opportunities for system optimization. However, the processed rms current analysis shows the self-balanced solution providing advantages in terms of efficiency, while the conventional buck/boost balancer offers a more cost-effective solution.

This paper investigates how circular economy strategies can extend the operational life of a modular dual active bridge (DAB) electric vehicle (EV) charger beyond what reliability studies predict. Two power-sharing strategies (PSSs) are analyzed for the same converter, with identical system efficiency and similar overall system lifetime. However, these two PSSs lead to significantly different DAB-level lifetime predictions. A circularity assessment is performed for both PSSs, focusing on the medium-long loops of the circular economy, namely refurbish, remanufacture, and repurpose. Lastly, a method is proposed to select the preferred PSS with the least environmental impact, based on the desired extended lifetime of the EV charger, which considers the market strategy adopted by the manufacturer.

The design of power electronics converters is a complex and time-consuming process, requiring the evaluation of multiple design topologies, components, and technologies to meet specific efficiency and cost targets. Traditional methods are often constrained by manual effort, limiting the number of possible solutions explored. This project proposes an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven assistant that leverages generative AI to automate and optimize the converter design process. The system will take user-defined input specifications, distinguishing between fixed and variable parameters, and generate a diverse set of potential designs. First, by integrating a structured and searchable database of converter technologies and components, the assistant intelligently explores a broad design space, including various topologies, manufacturers, and switching technologies. Second, it leverages similarity-based retrieval and constraint filtering to provide tailored component recommendations that align with the user’s technical requirements. Third, it performs iterative evaluation of candidate configurations, presenting the most competitive solutions through a Pareto efficiency–cost analysis, along with detailed technical specifications for each optimal design. Two case studies are presented to validate the methodology, demonstrating the assistant’s ability to rapidly identify high-quality design solutions while reducing engineering effort. These results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed AI-driven approach and open new directions for research in intelligent inverter design automation.

Recent years have seen power electronic converters rapidly approach high power densities while also being designed for high power capabilities. Owing to their effectiveness in energy conversion and control, modern power electronic converters have gained significant popularity in critical applications. Thus, the reliability and robustness of these converters to faults becomes an important area of research. This paper proposes an active redundancy module (ARM) and overlapped switching scheme as a modular, topology independent fault tolerant solution to be utilised for isolated DC-DC converters. The proposed ARM allows for convenient incorporation of fault tolerance in any given power converter topology without altering its fundamental principles of operation, and the overlapped switching scheme facilitates soft switching and current sharing within the ARM, thus reducing losses and improving the overall performance of the ARM. The proposed solution is analysed and validated through simulation as well as experimental results, followed by a discussion in comparison to existing fault tolerant solutions.

It is well known that fixed-frequency constant-coupling series(capacitor)-series(capacitor) (S(C)-S(C)) compensated inductive wireless power transfer links (IWPTL) may be designed to operate with load-independent voltage gain (LIVG) within bounds dictated by parameters of the loosely coupled transformer (LCT). Lately, it has been shown that these bounds may be extended by employing series(inductor)-series(capacitor) (S(L)-S(C)) or series(capacitor)-series(inductor) (S(C)-S(L)) compensation networks, allowing attaining arbitrary LIVG at the expense of utilizing full-rating inductors as compensation elements. This work proposes a design method allowing to simultaneously attain arbitrary LIVG with S(C)-S(C) compensated IWPTL and minimize inverter VA rating. The revealed methodology is validated in PSIM simulation and experiments.

The diffusion of electric mobility continues to grow, which requires that systems associated with electric vehicle (EV) charging keep up with this growth. Furthermore, it is important to continue the technological development of such systems to respond to faster and more efficient charging, to enrich the user experience. Aligned with such perspective, this paper proposes a modular interleaved-based DC-DC converter topology for electric vehicles fast chargers. The proposed DC-DC converter topology is based on a set of configurable DC-DC power modules with independent power inputs and single parallel power output. It is proposed to be used in high-charging power stations, with internal configuration based on multiple isolated DC-DC power conversion stages, where the proposed modular DC-DC converter topology is connected to perform the DC interface directly with the EV battery. With the proper control, the proposed modular DC-DC topology operates in interleaved-based strategy, ensuring a split current among the DC-DC modules, and a reduced ripple in the output current, despite not being a native interleaved topology. The output ripple current of each DC-DC module presents a frequency that matches twice the switching frequency. The results presented in this paper validate the proposed modular DC-DC topology, as well as the proposed control for steady- and transient-state.