KIoT

SECE

Chapter Two
Circuit Laws and Analysis Techniques
Lecture # 2

Jemal H. ( Msc )
KIoT, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering
jjemalassen@gmail.com

January, 2023

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 Chapter Contents

2.1. Introduction
2.2 . Circuit Laws
2.3 . Nodal Analysis
2.4. Mesh Analysis
2.5. Superposition Theorem
2.6. Source transformation
2.7. Thevenin’s Theorem

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 Introduction

• Circuit analysis is the mathematical analysis of any electrical circuit.

• Circuit analysis is finding the current and voltage on every element of the
circuit being analyzed.
• In other words, it is the calculation of unknown elements within a circuit,
such as the voltage or current.
• After simplifying a circuit as much as possible, all circuit analysis methods
will be applied:
• Create a set of independent equations based on the elements and
circuit connections.
• Solve the system of simultaneous equations for the independent
variables (voltages or currents).

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 Cont…

• Remind the following terms which are important for all circuit theorems and
analysis.
• Node. A point where two or more branches are connected together.
• Branch. A path that connects two nodes ( circuit element such as voltage or
current source or a resistor, capacitor, inductor.)
• Loop. A path whose last node is the same as the starting node

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 Circuit laws

Ohm’s law
• Ohm’s law states that the voltage V across a resistor is directly proportionally
to the current I flowing through the resistor.
V  IR
• The two extreme possible values of R are:
• Short circuit ( R= 0 ) the path is broken and interrupts current flow
• Open circuit (R=∞ ) the path is corrupted in someway and current
does not flow were it is intended.

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 Kirchhoff ’s Law

• The basic fundamental laws of circuit analysis.

– Kirchhoff’s Current Law (KCL) and
– Kirchhoff’s Voltage Law (KVL).
• Kirchhoff’s current law (KCL) states that the algebraic sum of currents entering a
node (or a closed boundary) is zero or
• The sum of currents entering node is equal to sum of currents leaving node.
• KCL is the basis of nodal analysis – in which the unknowns are the voltages at
each of the nodes of the circuit.
• Consider the node in the figure, then applying KCL gives

Rearranging the above

.

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 Cont…

● Kirchhoff’s voltage law (KVL) states that the algebraic sum of all voltages
around a closed path (or loop) is zero.

● Sum of voltage drops is equal to sum of voltage rises.

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 Example 2.1

● Determine and in the circuit shown below

● We apply KVL around the loop as shown in Fig. The result is

• Applying ohms law to 6 Ω resistor gives vo  6i

● Adding and substitute the voltage value,
and v o  48 V

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 Exercises

1. Determine and in the 2. Calculate and in the circuit

circuit shown below shown below

Answer

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 Nodal Analysis

• Nodal analysis is based on balancing currents coming into and out of nodes
in the circuits i.e KCL.
• The nodal analysis determines the voltage at each node with respect
to a reference node and uses it to calculate the branch currents in a
circuit.
• Uses a lesser number of equations to solve for branch currents than
KCL.
• So computational complexity is reduced.
• Nodal analysis provides a general procedure for analyzing circuits using node
voltages as the circuit variables.
• In nodal analysis, we are interested in finding the node voltages.

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 Cont…

• Steps to Determine Node Voltages:

1. Select a node as the reference node.
2. Assign voltage V1, V2, …Vn-1.to the remaining nodes. The voltages are
referenced with respect to the reference node ( ground node).
3. Apply KCL to each of the n-1 non-reference nodes.
4. Express branch currents in terms of the node voltages using Ohms Law.
5. Solve the resulting simultaneous equations to obtain the unknown
node voltages.
• Here in the circuit shown Node 3
is the reference node (v=0)
• While nodes 1 and 2 are assigned
voltages V1, V2 respectively.

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 Example 2.2

• Calculate the node voltage in the circuit shown below.

At node 1 At node 2
applying KCL and Ohm’s law gives

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 Nodal Analysis with Voltage Sources

• Case 1: If the voltage source is connected between the reference node and a
non-reference node :
• Set the voltage at the non-reference node equal to the magnitude
( voltage) of voltage source.
• Case 2: If the voltage source (dependent/independent) is connected
between two non-referenced nodes:
• The two non-reference nodes form a generalized node (Supernode).
• Apply both KCL and KVL to determine the node voltages .
• A supernode is formed by enclosing a (dependent or independent) voltage
source connected between two non-reference nodes and any elements
connected in parallel with it.
• The required two equations for regulating the two non-reference node voltages
are obtained by the KCL of the supernode and the relationship of node
voltages due to the voltage source

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 Example 2.3

• For the circuit shown in Fig. below find the node voltages.

• The super-node contains the 2-V source, nodes 1 and 2, and the 10 resistor.
Applying KCL to the super-node as shown in Fig. gives
Expressing and in terms of the node voltages

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 Cont…

• To get the relationship between and we apply KVL to the circuit in

Fig. below. Going around the loop, we obtain

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 Mesh analysis

• It is another procedure for analysing circuits that uses mesh currents as the
circuit variables ; applies KVL to find unknown currents.
• Only applicable to a circuit that is planar .
• Planar circuit is a circuit that can be drawn in a plane with no
branches crossing one another; otherwise, it is non-planar.
• A Mesh is a loop which does not contain any other loops within it.
Steps to Determine Mesh Currents:
1. Assign mesh currents i1, i2, .., in to the n meshes.
2. Apply KVL to each of the n meshes.
3. Use Ohm’s law to express the voltages in terms of the mesh currents.
4. Solve the resulting n simultaneous equations to get the mesh currents.

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 Example 2.4

• For the circuit in Fig. , find the branch currents using mesh analysis.

• We first obtain the mesh currents using KVL. For mesh 2

• For mesh 1

• Substituting mesh 1 equation in to mesh 2 equation we get the unknowns

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 Superposition Theorem

• It states that the voltage across (or current through) an element in a linear
circuit is the algebraic sum of the voltage across (or currents through) that
element due to each independent source acting alone.
• The principle of superposition helps us to analyze a linear circuit with more
than one independent source by calculating the contribution of each
independent source separately.
• If a circuit has two or more independent sources, one way to determine the
value of a specific variable (voltage or current) is to use nodal or mesh
analysis as discussed before.
• Another way is to determine the contribution of each independent source to
the variable and then add them up.
• The latter approach is known as the superposition.

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 Cont…

Steps to apply superposition principle

1. Turn off all independent sources except one source. Find the output
(voltage or current) due to that active source using nodal or mesh analysis.
2. Repeat step 1 for each of the other independent sources.
3. Find the total contribution by adding algebraically all the
contributions due to the independent sources.
Two things have to be kept in mind:
1. When we say turn off all other independent sources:
 Independent voltage sources are replaced by 0 V (short circuit) and
 Independent current sources are replaced by 0 A (open circuit).
2. Dependent sources are left intact because they are controlled by circuit
variables.

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 Example 2.5

• Use the superposition theorem to find v in the circuit shown below.

3A is discarded
by open-circuit

Applying KVL to the loop

v = 10V

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 Source Transformation

• An equivalent circuit is one whose v-i characteristics are identical with the
original circuit.
• It is the process of replacing a voltage source vS in series with a resistor R by
a current source iS in parallel with a resistor R, or vice versa.

Transformation of Independent source

Dependent source transform

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 Thevenin’s Theorem

• Thevenin’s Theorem states that: A linear two-terminal circuit can be

replaced by an equivalent circuit consisting of a voltage source, VTh
in series with a resistor, RTh.
VTh = open circuit voltage at the terminals
RTh = input or equivalent resistance at the terminal when the
independent sources are turned off.

Replacing a linear two-terminal circuit by its Thevenin equivalent:

(a) original circuit, (b) the Thevenin equivalent circuit.

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 Steps to find VTh and RTh

• The terminal are made open circuited by removing the load and determine
the Voc across the terminal, where Voc = VTh.
• Turn off all the independent sources and find the resistance, RTh ‘looking in’ at
the terminals.
• To Determine RTh (Case 1: No Dependent Sources)
• Turn off all independent sources.
• Find RTh where it is the equivalent resistance at point ‘a’ and ‘b’ terminals.
• To Determine RTh (Case 2: Circuit has Dependent Sources)
• Turn off all independent sources but dependent sources remain as they are.
• Introduce a voltage (or current) source across the ‘a’ and ‘b’ terminals.
• Determine the current through the load, IL and voltage across the load, VL
using the Thevenin equivalent circuit.

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 Cont…

• The current through the load and the voltage across the load are easily
determined once the Thevenin equivalent of the circuit at the load’s terminals is
obtained.

A circuit with a load: (a) original circuit, (b) Thevenin equivalent.

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 Example 2.6

• Find the Thevenin equivalent circuit of the circuit shown in Figure below to
the left of the terminals a-b.Then find the current through =6, 16 and
36

We find by turning off the 32-V voltage source (replacing it with a short circuit)
and the 2-A current source (replacing it with an open circuit).

Finding
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 Cont…

• The equivalent circuit looks like the following and can be

determined

To find consider the circuit above. Applying mesh analysis to the two loops,
we obtain
but

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 Cont…

• The Thevenin equivalent circuit is shown in Figure below

• The current through is

When
When

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 Maximum Power Transfer

• The Thevenin equivalent is useful in finding the maximum power a linear

circuit can deliver to a load.
• Maximum power is transferred to the load when the load resistance equals
the Thevenin resistance as seen from the load ( )

• For maximum power dissipated in RL, Pmax, for a given RTH, and VTH,
2
VTH
RL  RTH  Pmax 
4R TH

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 End of Slide
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