A ZVT–ZCT PWM synchronous buck converter with a simple passive auxiliary circuit for reduction of losses and efficiency enhancement

Zero Voltage Transition (ZVT); Zero Current Transition (ZCT); Synchronous buck converter (SBC); Pulse width modulation (PWM) Abstract In this paper, a Zero-Voltage-Transition (ZVT)–Zero-Current Transition (ZCT) Pulsewidth Modulated (PWM) synchronous buck converter (SBC), with a simple passive auxiliary circuit is proposed, which reduces the stresses and improves the efficiency by pacifying the conduction losses compared to a traditional PWM converter, typically suitable for photovoltaic applications. The important design feature of ZVT–ZCT PWM SBC converters is placement of resonant components that mollifies the conduction losses. Due to the ZVT–ZCT, the resonant components with low values are used, thereby resulting in the increase of switching frequency. The ZVT–ZCT operation of the proposed converter is presented through theoretical analysis. The characteristics of the proposed converter are verified with the simulation in the PSIM co-simulated with MATLAB/SIMULINK environment and implemented experimentally. 2014 Faculty of Engineering, Ain Shams University. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).