APPLICATION NOTE

RESONANT CONVERTER TOPOLOGIES

by M. Bildgen
1. INTRODUCTION resonant capacitor CRES connected in parallel. Energy
is supplied by a current source.The circuit and
Increasing the frequency of operation of power
waveforms are shown in figure 2.
converters is desirable, as it allows the size of circuit
magnetics and capacitors to be reduced, leading to If an output transformer is used, in certain cases
cheaper and more compact circuits. However, its parasitic inductance can be used as the resonant
increasing the frequency of operation also increases inductance (in both this and the zero voltage
switching losses and hence reduces system topology). However, as its value is generally
efficiency. One solution to this problem is to replace not known, the resonant frequency will not
the "chopper" switch of a standard SMPS topology be fixed, which may cause problems in the circuit
(Buck, Boost etc.) with a "resonant" switch, which design.
uses the resonances of circuit capacitances and
When the switch S is off, the resonant capcitor is
inductances to shape the waveform of either the
charged up with a more or less constant current,
current or the voltage across the switching element,
and so the voltage across it rises linearly.
such that when switching takes place, there is no
current through or voltage across it, and hence no When the switch is turned on, the energy stored in
power dissipation - see figure 1. A circuit employing the capacitor is transferred to the inductor, causing
this technique is known as a resonant converter (or, a sinusoidal current to flow in the switch. During the
more accurately, a quasi-resonant converter, as only negative half wave, the current flows through the
part of the resonant sinusoid is utilized). anti-paralleled diode, and so in this period there is
no current through or voltage across the switch; and
A Zero Current Switching (ZCS) circuit shapes the
it can be turned off without losses.
current waveform, while a Zero Voltage Switching
(ZVS) circuit shapes the voltage waveform. This type of switching is also known as thyristor
mode, as it is one of the more suitable ways of using
2. ZERO CURRENT SWITCH
thyristors; these devices will only turn off if the current
A typical Zero Current Switch consists of a switch, through them is forced to zero, which occurs naturally
S, in series with the resonant inductor LRES, and the in this topology.

Figure 1. Current and voltage waveforms of hard and resonant switching systems

HARD SWITCHING RESONANT SWITCHING

Losses Losses

AN658/1194 1/5
APPLICATION NOTE

3. ZERO VOLTAGE SWITCH 4. POWER SEMICONDUCTORS IN RESONANT

CONVERTERS
A typical Zero Voltage Switch consists of a switch in
series with a diode. The resonant capacitor is Because they require a substantial drive current,
connected in parallel, and the resonant inductor is Bipolar transistors are not generally used in resonant
connected in series with this configuration. A voltage converters, unless the base drive is provided by the
source connected in parallel injects the energy into resonant circuit itself (for example in TV deflection
this system. The circuit and waveforms are shown circuits and fluorescent lamp ballasts). Power
in figure 3. MOSFETs and IGBTs, with their effectively
capacitive inputs and low drive energy requirements,
When the switch is turned on, a linear current flows
are the most frequently used types.
through the inductor. When the switch turns off, the
energy that is stored in the inductor flows into the The graph in figure 4 shows the die size of Power
resonant capacitor. The resulting voltage across the MOSFETs and IGBTs required to conduct 1 amp
capacitor and the switch is sinusoidal. The negative with a voltage drop of 2 volts, against the maximum
half-wave of the voltage is blocked by the diode. rated voltage. For low voltage applications, the
During this negative half wave, the current and MOSFET is interesting, as the die size is very small
voltage in the switch are zero, and so it can be (and so the device is cheap). However for higher
turned on without losses. breakdown voltages, the IGBT is more suitable, as

Figure 2. Full-wave zero-current switch - topology and waveforms

VSWITCH ISWITCH

Lr
Cr Diode fwd voltage

IDIODE
VSWITCH

ISWITCH

IDIODE

Figure 3. Full-wave zero-voltage switch - topology and waveforms

VSWITCH
Lr
ISWITCH

IDIODE
VSWITCH

ISWITCH

Cr
IDIODE

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 APPLICATION NOTE

Figure 4. Comparison of MOSFET and IGBT Figure 5. Simple MOSFET model

Silicon area
(mm2 / A) D D

10 RDS(on)
VOLTAGE DROP = 2V
MOSFET
G G COUT

5
IGBT

0 S S
0 500 VMAX (V)

the die size required is almost constant approaching 4.2 IGBTs

the maximum rated voltage.
The IGBT has a threshold voltage of around 0.7V; a
4.1 MOSFETs voltage drop lower than this value is not possible.
The “resistive part” of the output characteristics of
The MOSFET has a resistive behaviour in its on
an IGBT is very low, and so it can conduct large
state, and the output characteristic passes through
currents with a low voltage drop. It is thus most
zero. It can conduct a small current with a very low
suitable for use at high current densities.
voltage drop.
An IGBT can be simply modelled as a pnp-transistor
4.1.1 Zero Current Switch
driven by a MOSFET. The disadvantage of this
A MOSFET can be modelled as an ideal switch with structure is the turn off. If a pnp transistor is to be
a series resistance, and a capacitor connected in turned off quickly, a positive base current must be
parallel - see figure 5. Every time it is turned on, the supplied, to force the carriers in the base to
parallel capacitor is discharged through the recombine and stop the device conducting. In the
resistance and (0.5 x Cout x VDS) units are lost. A IGBT, the base of the pnp stage cannot be accessed
MOSFET in a Zero Current Switch will have to turn directly, and so this current cannot be delivered at
on with a high drain-source voltage, and there will be turn off, meaning that the device continues to conduct
capacitive switching losses. Additionally, the reactive while the carriers recombine "naturally". During this
overcurrent in the switch is very high, and as the time, a current tail appears.
MOSFET does not perform well in overcurrent
4.2.1 Zero Voltage Switch
conditions, the conduction losses will be very high.
Therefore the MOSFET is not very suitable as a In a Zero Voltage Switch, the IGBT must turn off a
Zero Current Switch. current. Even if the voltage across the switch rises
with a limited dV/dt (sinusoidal waveform), the current
4.1.2 Zero Voltage Switch
tail phenomenon means that turn off losses will be
In a Zero Voltage Switch, the MOSFET turns on important. Therefore the IGBT is not very suitable
without any voltage between drain and source, and for zero voltage switching.
so there are no capacitive switching losses. There is
4.2.2 Zero Current Switch
no reactive overcurrent and the conduction losses
are not very important. The MOSFET does have to In a Zero Current Switch, the external circuit defines
turn off a current, but as the switching times of a the current in the switch. This current tends to zero,
MOSFET are small, the turn off losses will not be and hence the IGBT does not turn off current, so no
excessive. tail appears. Another problem that can occur with

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APPLICATION NOTE

the IGBT, latching, does not occur in this mode. efficiently. However, the switch now has to turn on
Even if the IGBT latches at the maximum current, it at a non-zero current level, and as the diodes turn
can turn off later because the current is defined by off at a high current level (e.g. point A in figure 7),
the external circuit. The carriers that remained in the losses due to their recovery time will be high.
base of the pnp-transistor can be recovered by a
5.2 Dual Thyristor Mode
positive current into the base. In a Zero Current
Switch, the negative half wave of the resonant current The effect of the diode recovery time can be reduced
flows through the antiparallel diode. During that time, by increasing the switching frequency further - see
a negative voltage is applied to the IGBT. A current figure 8. In this case, the diode turns off at zero
flows through the body diode of the internal MOSFET current.
into the base of the pnp-transistor. The main advantage of this type of circuit is that the
5. TWO-SWITCH RESONANT CONVERTERS intrinsic diode of the MOSFET, which has very poor
reverse recovery characteristics, can be used in the
As in standard power converters, for higher power
circuit, removing the need for a further discrete diode.
applications, two switches can be connected as
shown in figure 6 to form a half-bridge resonant CONCLUSIONS
converter. The same passive components are used Resonant converter topologies can be used to
for the resonance of both switches, and a transformer increase circuit switching speeds, allowing the cost
has been added to drive the load. of circuit magnetics to be reduced, while still keeping
5.1 Thyristor Mode switching losses to a minimum. Full wave rather
than half wave topologies are generally used, as
In the example above, the commutation frequency
they generate less EMI. Capacitive switching losses
of the switches (fSW) is lower than the resonant
when turning on with a high drain-source voltage
frequency of the circuit (f0). This results in a "dead"
means that MOSFETs are more suitable for
zone in the transformer waveform, giving a poor
Zero -Voltage than Zero-Current switches, while its
overall efficiency. If the switching frequency is
poor turn-off characteristics mean that the IGBT is
increased, as shown in figure 8, the resonant
more suited to Zero-Current topologies.
waveforms overlap and the transformer is used more

Figure 6. Half-Bridge Zero-Current resonant converter

+VCC OUTPUT

S1 D1 S1
Cr
Lr
S2

i "Dead"
zone

S2 D2
i
"Dead"
zone
-VCC

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 APPLICATION NOTE

Figure 7. Half-Bridge waveforms with fSW > f0 Figure 8. Half-Bridge waveforms with fSW >> f0

S1 S1

S2 S2

S1

S1
D2
A
i i

D1
S2

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