578
3, MAY 2006
Automotive DCDC Bidirectional Converter
Made With Many Interleaved Buck Stages
Oscar Garca, Member, IEEE, Pablo Zumel, Angel de Castro, and Jos A. Cobos, Member, IEEE
AbstractInterleaving technique is used in some applications
due to its advantages regarding filter reduction, dynamic response,
and power management. In dual battery system vehicles, the bidi-
rectional dcdc converter takes advantage of this technique using
three-to-five paralleled buck stages.
In this paper, we propose the use of a much higher number of
phases in parallel together with digital control. It will be shown
that this approach opens new possibilities since changes in the tech-
nology are possible. Thus, two 1000-W prototypes have been de-
signed using surface mount technology devices (SO-8 transistors).
An additional important feature is that due to the accuracy of the
digital device [field-programmable gate array (FPGA)], current
loops have been eliminated, greatly simplifying the implementa-
tion of the control stage.
Index TermsDigital control, field-programmable gate array
(FPGA), surface mount technology (SMT).
I. INTRODUCTION
A UTOMOTIVE electronics are one field of power elec-
tronics that has been growing rapidly in recent years.
Some good examples of this are the electronics involved in the
dual battery system vehicles that use 14-V and 42-V batteries.
One of the specific converters for these vehicles is the bidi-
rectional module placed in between those batteries that is in
charge of the power flow. Typically, the power of this converter
ranges from 500 to 1000 W. Due to the relative high current
of this application, some approaches use the interleaving tech-
nique [1]. The main advantages of using this technique in this
application are the filters reduction and efficiency. State of the
art engineering for this application proposes the use of three
to five paralleled buck stages (phases) to build the converter
[2][5]. A comparison between this multiphase converter with a
single buck converter is carried out in [2], where the advantage
of this technique for this application can be seen. Reference
[3] proposes a CAD tool to calculate the number of phases to
optimize cost, size, and weight. A similar analysis, but more
oriented to calculate power losses, can be found in [4]. A
magnetic component to couple all the phases is introduced in
[5], obtaining a size reduction compared with inductors for
the same power losses. A quite different solution is presented
in [6], where the authors propose a multilevel converter to
Manuscript received March 9, 2005; revised October 26, 2005. This work
was presented in part at PESC04 and APEC05. Recommended by Associate
Editor J. Shen.
O. Garca, A. de Castro, and J. A. Cobos are with the Divisin de Inge-
niera Electrnica, Universidad Politcnica de Madrid, Madrid 28006, Madrid.
(e-mail: o.garcia@upm.es).
P. Zumel is with the Departamento de Tecnologa Electrnica, Universidad
Carlos III de Madrid, Madrid, Spain.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPEL.2006.872379
0885-8993/$20.00 2006 IEEE
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 21, NO.
decrease the voltage stress in the transistors and to eliminate
the inductor. Finally, a procedure to design this type of power
converter based on models implemented in Matlab is shown in
[7]. References [2] and [3] are deeply analyzed and compared
in Table II.
Using interleaving, the power stage of a converter is divided
into several and smaller power stages. Therefore, the size of
each component is reduced. With a very high number of inter-
leaved phases, the current stress is greatly reduced and using a
different technology becomes a possibility. This change of tech-
nology may bring several advantages:
power converter is made of surface mount technology
(SMT) components;
automatic assembly;
absence of heatsinks (usually heatsinks require manual as-
sembly);
magnetic components can be planar or SMT. Repetitivity
is greatly increased;
very small input and output filters.
However, there are some challenges to face a many-phases
converter.
General purpose integrated circuits (ICs) cannot be used
because there are many phases. Specific digital control is
required.
Introducing a current loop per phase will not be cost-effec-
tive. Passive current equalization should be considered.
In this paper, two multiphase dc/dc converters made of many
interleaved phases (16 and 36) for automotive application are
proposed. Apart from the aforementioned advantages, the mea-
sures in the prototypes show a very good efficiency (94%95%)
at full load (1000 W).
II. POWER STAGE DESIGN
The converter will be implemented using the synchronous
buck configuration because it is suitable for this specification
and it is used for most of the authors [2][5]. It has bidirec-
tional capability and efficiency is quite good. No isolation is
needed between both batteries and therefore, topologies with
transformers are unnecessary. Fig. 1 shows a multiphase syn-
chronous buck dc/dc converter.
The design has been guided by the compromise of using SMT
components. The number of phases has been selected to reduce
the dc current enough to use small transistors. Thus, two de-
signs have been considered as shown in Table I. In the first
one, with 16 phases, each metal-oxide-semiconductor field-ef-
fect transistor (MOSFET) needs a SO-8 case while the second,
with 36 phases, has its two MOSFETs of each phase in the same
SO-8 case.
GARCA et al.: AUTOMOTIVE DCDC BIDIRECTIONAL CONVERTER
Fig. 2. PCB windings of the RM7 inductor and phase layout.
Fig. 1. Multiphase synchronous buck dc/dc converter.
TABLE I
BRIEF OVERVIEW OF THE TWO PROPOSED DESIGNS
The key design parameter is the number of phases and the
phase current ripple. It is not easy to determine it since many
calculations should be done and many technologies should be
taken into account. A guideline can be found in [8]. Note that
the effect of increasing the number of phases in each particular
component (transistors, inductors, capacitors) is different. Here
is a brief summary.
Transistors: there are three types of power losses in the
MOSFETs. Both conduction and capacitive losses are rel-
atively easy to calculate being proportional to the on-resis-
tance and capacitances, respectively. However, switching
losses are much more complex because they depend on
a higher number of parameters, some of them out of the
switch itself (leakage inductance, driver output current,
). In a first approximation, these losses are calculated
using the constant switching time of the device given in
the datasheet. However, in the real world, these switching
times (rise and fall times) are load dependent.
For a given MOSFET technology (product is con-
stant) there is no advantage in increasing the number of
phases if the total area of silicon is the same: a higher
number of phases will use smaller transistors. Therefore,
each transistor has a higher on-resistance but handles less
current keeping the conduction losses constant. The same
579
can be said about the capacitive losses because each tran-
sistor has a smaller capacitance but the addition of all of
them is constant. Switching losses are also constant if rise
and fall times are considered independent of the number of
phases.
In the case of using discrete semiconductors, the calcula-
tions should be done for each particular design since the
technology is different for each manufacturer. At least, the
advantage of using a high number of phases is that due to
ripple cancellation the switching frequency can be reduced
and, therefore, the switching and capacitive losses are re-
duced.
Inductors: the optimum number of phases from the point
of view of the magnetic component is hard to determine.
From the point of view of inductors, high current ripple is
preferred for the same averaged current, since it implies
lower losses in the inductor. However, several phases are
required in order to obtain a high cancellation of phase
current ripple and then a small output capacitance.
Each time a phase is added, the average current of it is
divided; if inductance is increased in the same way, the
total energy in the inductors is kept constant. Thus, size is
not drastically affected. However, a size reduction can be
obtained if inductance is kept constant when a new phase is
added and then the phase current ripple ratio is increased.
But finally, for a high number of phases, inductance should
be increased to avoid a very high current ripple with a very
small dc current. This will produce a poor efficiency.
Anyway, a high number of phases allows the use of small
magnetic components, and packaging may be improved
quite a bit, especially the height. In this case, the use of
16 phases allows an easy implementation of the inductor
using a RM7 core. Six turns are required and windings are
embedded in the printed circuit board (PCB) as shown in
Fig. 2.
Capacitors: a high degree of interleaving produces a ripple
cancellation that reduces the filter needs. As a result, the
designer can take advantage of ceramic capacitors. Both
capacitors are reduced although, in practice, the minimum
input capacitance is limited by the pulsating input current
of each phase. For a high number of phases, nonideal ef-
fects must be taken into account. Inductor tolerances pro-
duce different values in the current ripple per phase, and
then the output capacitance for the same output voltage
ripple is higher than in the ideal case.
580
TABLE II
COMPARISON OF SEVERAL DC/DC CONVERTERS FOR THE SAME APPLICATION BUT WITH DIFFERENT NUMBER OF INTERLEAVED PHASES
Another advantage of interleaving is ripple cancellation [9].
With a very high number of phases, the current ripple at the
output is nearly negligible at every input voltage. Therefore, the
output capacitor is really small.
Table II shows a comparison among several designs for the
automotive 42/14-V bidirectional converter. All of them have
been designed for 1000 W. Single phase design is theoretical;
state of the art columns are taken from [2] and [3] (data between
brackets are estimations); finally, the last two columns with the
proposed designs have been included. Other examples [4], [5]
designed for smaller amounts of power (400500 W) also use a
small number of phases such as 3 or 4.
Regarding this table, some comments can be made.
The higher the number of phases, the smaller the MOSFET
size. A high number of phases allows the use of SMT tran-
sistors. Moreover, with a proper design heatsinks can be
avoided.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 21, NO. 3, MAY 2006
The same can be said about the inductors, obtaining a small
size for Design II. Even with 36 phases, the total inductor
volume is smaller compared with the others designs.
Output capacitance: with 16 interleaved phases, there is a
very high ripple cancellation for every duty cycle. How-
ever, the tolerances in the inductance forces one to use a
relatively large output capacitor (the authors do not know
if previous works have considered this phenomenon). This
effect is much smaller in the 36-phase converter where a
small filter is obtained.
Two differential features are common to these two designs:
first, they do not use commercial ICs to control, but specific
circuits using digital devices; second, no heatsinks are used
in them. This is one of the most important differences be-
cause it simplifies the constructive process and reduces the
cost.
Efficiency in the proposed designs is very high.
GARCA et al.: AUTOMOTIVE DCDC BIDIRECTIONAL CONVERTER
Fig. 3. Simplified control scheme implemented in a FPGA to control the con-
verter.
The main conclusion obtained from the previous table is that
in using many phases, a change of technology is possible ob-
taining very good results from the point of view of efficiency
and size.
From the point of view of cost, the present approach has
one differential advantage compared with other solutions of the
state of the art: all the components are SMD including induc-
tors and, therefore, the converter can be mounted automatically.
This drastically reduces the cost when compared with manual
assembly. Moreover, the absence of heatsinks significantly sim-
plifies the mechanical issues. On the other hand, these designs
require more components.
III. CONTROL STAGE DESIGN
The control circuit is in charge of generating the driving sig-
nals for the 16 phases, that is, 32 transistors in Design I and
36 (72 transistors) in Design II. Since the converter is bidirec-
tional, input and output voltages should be measured to generate
pulses. Interleaved converters proposed in the state of the art do
require a current loop in each phase to control the dc current per
phase.
Using a digital control, the accuracy of these pulses is so high
that the present phases current are not measured. Therefore, the
control circuit is quite simple. Although there are other factors
that affect current unbalance, this is the main factor responsable.
The control stage is digital and has been implemented in a
field-programmable gate array (FPGA). A general scheme is
shown in Fig. 3. The digital circuit is composed of five parts.
ADC interface and filter: control of analog to digital con-
verters and filter to remove noise from samples.
Regulator: it calculates duty cycle. Its control algorithm
has been designed using the root-locus technique and cal-
culated directly in the digital domain for obtaining better
results.
MCD generator: generates the pulse for the free-wheeling
transistor. Thus, the converter changes automatically to
DCM when possible (usually at low load).
Phase shifter: this block generates shifted signals form the
duty cycle [10].
Protections: some basic protections are included. The ad-
vantage is that they are included without additional cost.
The control circuit has been implemented in a Xilinx
XCV200E FPGA. The final control circuit is quite small using
581
Fig. 4. Addition and comparison of (a) hardware structure and (b) its workings.
10 085 equivalent gates (3.4% of the device), so a smaller
and cheaper FPGA could also be used. Thanks to the FPGA
concurrency (all its logic is executed in parallel) a high number
of driving signals can be generated without any drawback in
the performance of the rest of the controller. Furthermore, its
high processing speed allows a very accurate signal generation,
which is the key for passive current sharing in continuous con-
duction mode (CCM). This controller can work at frequencies
above 50 MHz, allowing a high duty cycle resolution (over
400 different duty cycles are possible).
In order to implement the phase-shifter block, two different
digital hardware structures are proposed. Both are considered
for implementation using custom hardware.
A. Addition and Comparison Phase-Shifter
The first possibility is to add some constants to the main
counter, with the results translated to the range of the counter
in case of overflow, and then compare each sum to the duty
cycle [see Fig. 4(a)]. These sums are in fact equivalent to phase-
shifted counters [see Fig. 4(b)], being the delay between them
proportional to the constant that has been added. In order to ob-
tain homogeneous distribution along the switching cycle, the
constants to be added are
(1)
being the phase number, the number of phases, and
the resolution of the duty cycle, which is equal to the range of
the counter.
Other equivalent hardware structure would be substituting the
additions by counters, assuring that these counters were delayed
according to expression (1).
B. Shift-Register Phase-Shifter
The second possibility is to introduce the driving signal of
the first phase into a shift-register [see Fig. 5(a)]. In this way,
a delay is obtained which is equal to the length of the shift-
register multiplied by the clock cycle. The total length of the
shift-register is at most equal to , while each driving signal
is extracted from the position obtained by expression (1). These
582
Fig. 5. (a) Shift-register hardware structure and (b) its workings.
delays are equivalent to the desired phase-shifting operation [see
Fig. 5(b)].
C. Phase-Shifters Comparison
Three comparison criteria can be used to distinguish between
these two solutions.
Duty cycle resolution. The shift-register method leads to
shorter critical paths. Therefore, higher clock frequency
can be achieved and, as a consequence, duty cycle reso-
lution can be increased.
Closed-loop dynamics. Using addition and compar-
ison phase-shifters, duty cycle changes start affecting
all driving signals immediately, while for shift-register
phase-shifters these changes only affect the first phase
immediately. The rest of the phases are affected only after
a time equal to their delay. Therefore, somewhat higher
closed-loop dynamics is achieved with the addition and
comparison method.
Area. The addition and comparison phase-shifter is very
sensitive to the number of phases, as each phase needs its
own adder and comparator. The shift-register phase-shifter
is not sensitive to the number of phases, as including more
phases needs is just extracting more driving signals from
the already available shift-register. However, it is sensitive
to the duty cycle resolution, as the length of the shift-reg-
ister is proportional to it.
IV. CURRENT SHARING
One of the concerns of the interleaved converters is current
sharing. Commercial integrated circuits solve this problem by
including an additional current loop [11], [12]. As a conse-
quence, the cost of the IC is quite high. Also, the additional
circuitry grows, increasing size and decreasing reliability.
Therefore, although the aforementioned IC controllers have
been designed with the capability of paralleling some of them,
in practice, a high number of phases is not feasible.
The purpose of this paper is to use a high number of phases
but without any current loop. The dc current depends strongly
on the conduction mode of the converter.
A. Continuous Conduction Mode (CCM)
Fig. 6 shows the equivalent dc circuit of a multiphase buck
converter when it operates in CCM. Each phase is characterized
by a dc parasitic resistance ; the voltage applied to this re-
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 21, NO. 3, MAY 2006
Fig. 6. Equivalent dc circuit of the multiphase buck converter working in CCM.
sistance is the input voltage multiplied by the actual duty
cycle of this phase .
In case of passive load , the output voltage of the con-
verter can be calculated from the aforementioned param-
eters ( , , and ) with the following expression:
(2)
Note that if the load is a battery, the output voltage is just
the battery voltage and (2) is not used. Once is known, the
current through each phase is easily calculated
(3)
The worst-case for a single phase takes place when this phase
has the maximum duty cycle and the minimum resistance while
the rest have minimum duty cycle and maximum resistance.
In such a case, the phase current is maximum while the other
phases will handle a current below the average value . In
order to determine which of both factors (differences in duty
cycle or in resistance) is the most important, we can analyze
each one independently. This analysis can be found in detail in
[13], but the main results are the following ones. The differences
caused by resistance unbalance when only one resistance is dif-
ferent from the others can be calculated as shown in
(4)
being the common resistance for the rest of the phases and
the difference in the unbalanced resistance. On the other
hand, the differences caused by duty cycle unbalance when only
one duty cycle is different from the others can be calculated as
shown in
(5)
being the common duty cycle for the rest of the phases,
the difference in the unbalanced duty cycle, and the power
efficiency due to losses on the resistance exclusively.
GARCA et al.: AUTOMOTIVE DCDC BIDIRECTIONAL CONVERTER
Fig. 7. Inductor current in DCM.
In order to compare both factors, a numerical example is an-
alyzed. For a 16-phases converter with 98% efficiency due to
resistance (2% losses in the resistance), a 10% difference in one
of the resistances causes less than a 10% difference in the cur-
rent of that phase. However, for the same converter a minimum
1% difference in one of the duty cycles causes a 47% unbalance
in the current of the unbalanced phase. As it can be seen, duty
cycle is responsible for the main current unbalance unless the
resistance causes very high losses (over 10%), which is avoided
by design. Regarding the inductor value, its differences cause
only unbalanced current ripples (peak to peak), but the dc cur-
rent per phase is unaffected in CCM. However, it affects dc cur-
rent in discontinuous conduction mode (DCM), as explained in
the next point.
Therefore, it can be stated that duty cycle is the main cause of
current unbalance in CCM. However, the use of digital control
drastically reduces unbalances caused by duty cycle, because
the driving signal is generated with great accuracy (differences
below 1 ns). Differences in duty cycle of the phases will be
produced by drivers and MOSFETs variations (so they should
be chosen taking this into account).
Thus, in many cases, it is possible to eliminate current sensing
circuits, current loops, and all the associated circuitry. In con-
clusion, the control stage is composed of a single voltage loop
and driving signals generator, making it feasible to build a multi-
phase converter with many phases (more than the classical three
or four) at a reasonable cost.
In the experimental results section, the converter has been
designed without current loops trusting in the digital control for
current equalization. It will be seen that it is not necessary to
include this current loop.
B. Discontinuous Conduction Mode (DCM)
DCM is a very interesting option for multiphase converters
because the equalization of the currents is much better. Inductor
current of a single phase in a switching cycle is shown in Fig. 7.
The average value of the inductor current (output current of a
phase) can be calculated from Fig. 7 and is defined in
(6)
In DCM, the differences in phase current are caused by duty
cycle and inductance and not parasitic resistance (in a first ap-
proximation). However, since each phase current starts from
zero every switching cycle, the average values are quite sim-
ilar even having relatively different duty cycles. For example,
a 1% difference in duty cycle causes a 2% current unbalance,
583
TABLE III
DC CURRENT VALUES IN DCM AND CCM
FOR 1% AND 5% DUTY CYCLE INEQUALITIES
and even a 5% difference in duty cycle causes just a 10% cur-
rent unbalance. Regarding the inductor value, a 10% difference
causes a 9% current unbalance, and even a 20% difference in
inductance causes just a 17% current unbalance.
C. Comparison Between CCM and DCM
Table III shows a numerical comparison between these two
conduction modes in terms of current unbalance. The calcula-
tions have been carried out for the following specifications and
data.
Sixteen-phases synchronous buck converter (to test DCM,
free-wheeling MOSFETs is turned-off when current
reaches 0).
One phase has 1% (or 5%) higher duty cycle than the other
15 phases.
Input voltage: 42 .
Output voltage: 14 .
Output power: 1000 W.
Inductance: 5.4 H.
Parasitic resistance: 35 m MOSFET inductor .
Switching frequency: 120 kHz.
With a relative small duty cycle deviation such as 1%, CCM
shows an unacceptable current unbalance (current is 1.84
the nominal) while DCM current unbalance is kept below 2%.
Therefore, if CCM mode is preferred the duty cycle should be
very precise or the designer is forced to include one current
loop per phase. Table II shows the benefits of operating in DCM
even if the duty cycle is not very accurate. With a 5% deviation,
the current is only 10% over the average.
Therefore, a conservative criterion is to select DCM as an
operation mode. Thus, current loops can be removed obtaining a
very good current balance. However, due to the accuracy of the
digital control, the dc currents are very similar in CCM as will
be shown in the next section. This operation mode is interesting
because root-mean-square (RMS) currents are smaller at full
load, and therefore the converter efficiency is higher.
V. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
The converters have been designed according to the following
specifications.
High voltage side: 42 V.
Low voltage side: 14 V.
Output power: 1000 W.
No current loops.
584
Fig. 8. Current ripple per phase in Design I.
Fig. 9. Measured efficiency of Design I as a function of the output current.
Digital control, implemented in an FPGA.
Two designs have been carried out. Design I with 16 phases
and Design II with 36.
A. Design I
Main characteristics of this prototype are as follows.
Number of phases: 16.
Power per phase: 62.5 W.
Phase switching frequency: 150 kHz.
Inductor per phase: 5.4 H (RM7).
MOSFETs: SI4450DY (SO-8 package).
Driver: IR2181S (2 drivers in a SO-8 package).
The current per phase at full load is shown in Fig. 8. It can
be seen that the current ripple is high enough to achieve zero-
voltage switcing (ZVS) in both transitions. In these conditions,
the efficiency is maximum (it has been experimentally checked
[14]) and a good current balance is achieved. This prototype has
been tested in CCM and DCM to see the performance about
current unbalance [15]. The main conclusion is that DCM is
much better than CCM but, thanks to the accuracy of the digital
control, the equilibrium in CCM is quite good.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 21, NO. 3, MAY 2006
Fig. 10. Prototype made with 16 phases: (a) single phase power stage and (b)
whole power stage.
The efficiency of the converter is shown in Fig. 9. Maximum
value is 95% at full load. No heatsink is used at room tempera-
ture.
Finally, Fig. 10 shows two pictures of the power stage of the
converter. The main characteristic is that it has been possible
to use low profile components obtaining a 10-mm height and
1000-W converter (tallest component is an RM7 core embebbed
in the PCB).
B. Design II
The main characteristics of this prototype are as follows.
Number of phases: 36.
Power per phase: 27.7 W.
Phase switching frequency: 100 kHz.
Inductor per phase: 47 H (WE PD-47).
MOSFETs: IRF7341 (two transistors in a SO-8 package).
Driver: IR2181S (two drivers in a SO-8 package).
Compared with the previously presented prototype, the main
difference is that this design runs in CCM but with positive cur-
rent (current ripple is small compared to the dc current value).
In these conditions, the dc current through each phase is only
defined by the parasitic resistances and duty cycle inequalities
[see (3)]. Measured current waveforms in steady-state condi-
tions are shown in Fig. 11(a) and (c). Although no current loops
have been used, dc currents through each phase are quite sim-
ilar even during transients as shown in Fig. 12 (only four phase
currents are shown). All of them are in the range 10% at full
load. Fig. 11(b) and (d) shows the dc phase current values.
Design II has a maximum efficiency of 94% with 50 A and
93.5% at full load as shown in Fig. 13. A converter with 36
phases is shown in Fig. 14. The converter is composed of two
stacked PCBs with a pair of connectors between. The first PCB
contains the power transistors (on the top side) and the drivers
(bottom side); the second PCB includes the inductors and the
output capacitors.
VI. CONCLUSION
The interleaving technique has several advantages such as fil-
ters reduction, better dynamic response, and better thermal man-
agement. Besides the classical approach, using a high number
of phases brings other advantages. In particular, power compo-
nents can be SMD and/or inductors can be integrated in the PCB.
Thus, the converter is repetitivity increased, the assembly can be
automatic, and even heatsinks can be removed.
In this paper, two multiphase 1000-W dcdc converters made
of many interleaved buck phases (16 and 36) are proposed.
GARCA et al.: AUTOMOTIVE DCDC BIDIRECTIONAL CONVERTER 585

Fig. 11. (a) Measured current waveforms and (b) dc value in the 36-phases prototype at half-load; same in (c) and (d) but at full load.

Fig. 13. Efficiency of the converter with 36 phases as a function of the output
current.
Fig. 12. Evolution of four phase currents of the converter during a transient.

The converter can be designed avoiding the use of current

These converters have been designed with automotive specifi-
cations. The main feature is that they have been implemented
using surface mounting devices (SMD), keeping a very good
efficiency (94%95%), and avoiding the use of heatsinks. Thus,
the look of these dc/dc converters is rather different than others
of the state of the art in the same power range, mainly because
their low profile.
The two main problems associated with many power stages
have been overcome in this proposal.
loops that would not be feasible with a very high number
of phases. Although DCM is preferred, it is possible also
in CCM as shown in the prototypes. DC currents are in the
10% range without any active compensation mechanism.
A specific digital control has been built. There are many
signals to generate but all of them are simple. Thanks to
the accuracy and concurrency, an FPGA is the suitable de-
vice that contributes to equalize the dc currents of the con-
verters.
586
Fig. 14. Prototype made with 36 phases: (a) MOSFETs and drivers PCB and
(b) inductors and capacitors PCB.
The feasibility of building a medium power converter using
very small power transistors and magnetic components and
using low power techniques has been demonstrated.
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 21, NO. 3, MAY 2006
Oscar Garca (M99) was born in Madrid, Spain, in
1968. He received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in elec-
tronic engineering from the Universidad Politcnica
de Madrid (UPM), Madrid, Spain, in 1992 and 1999,
respectively.
He is an Associate Professor with UPM. He has
been involved in more than 25 research projects,
holds three patents, and he has published nearly 100
papers in IEEE conferences and journals. His re-
search interests are switching mode power supplies,
power factor correction, power architectures, and
digital control applied to power electronics.
Dr. Garcia is a member of the IEEE-PELS-IES Spanish Chapter.
Pablo Zumel received the B.S degree in electrical
engineering from the University of Burgos, Burgos,
Spain, in 1995, the M.S. from the Ecole Centrale
Paris, Paris, France, in 2000, and the M.S. and
Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the
Universidad Politcnica de Madrid (UPM), Madrid,
Spain, in 1999 and 2005, respectively.
From 1999 to 2003, he was a Researcher in the Di-
visin de Ingeniera Electrnica, UPM. Since 2003,
he has been with the Departamento de Tecnologa
Electrnica, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, where
he is currently an Assistant Professor. His current research interests include mul-
tiphase dcdc converters, magnetic integration, digital control in power elec-
tronics and educational issues on power electronics.
Angel de Castro was born in Madrid, Spain, in 1975.
He received the M.Sc. and the Ph.D. degrees in elec-
trical engineering from the Universidad Politcnica
de Madrid (UPM), Madrid, Spain, in 1999 and 2004,
respectively.
He has been an Assistant Professor with UPM
since 2003. His research interests include digital
control of switching mode power supplies, digital
circuits design, sensor networking, and smart trans-
ducers.
Jos A. Cobos (M92) received the M.S. and Ph.D.
degrees in electrical engineering from the Univer-
sidad Politcnica de Madrid (UPM), Madrid, Spain,
in 1989 and 1994, respectively.
He has been a Professor with UPM since 2001.
He is Vice Dean for Research and Doctoral studies
of the ETS Ingenieros Industriales of the UPM. His
contributions are focused in the field of power supply
systems for telecom, aerospace, automotive and med-
ical applications. His research interests include low
output voltage, magnetic components, piezoelectric
transformers, transcutaneous energy transfer, and dynamic power management.
He has published over 150 technical papers and holds three patents. He has been
actively involved in over 40 R&D projects for companies in Europe, USA, and
Australia.
Dr. Cobos received several awards, including the UPM Research and
Development Award for faculty less than 35 years of age and the Richard
Bass Outstanding Young Power Electronics Award of the IEEE in 2000. He
is an Associate Editor of the IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS LETTERSand the
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS. He is an AdCom member
of the IEEE Power Electronics Society (PELS), and Chair of the Technical
Committee on dc Power Systems.