1

Assignment 01
Muhammad Mohsin Khawaja
Reg No: 118339
MS-EE-PEC-3

I. R ESEARCH P ROBLEM
Area of Research I am interested in is Different Control
Methods for DC-DC Boost Converter in Continuous Conduction Mode. I will be comparing different Linear and Nonlinear
control methods used to determine Pulse Width Modulation(PWM) signals for the Switching Action/Duty Cycle D
of Power MOSFET used in the DC-DC Boost Converter.

2) Duty Cycle: For a given sampling time Ts , duty cycle

D is defined as the ratio of ON time Ton and sampling
time Ts , it can also be defined as the percentage of Ts
PWM generates a digital signal of one.
D=

Ton
Ts

also
D + D0 = 1
3) CCM: A DC-DC converter is said to be operating
in Continuous Conduction Mode(CCM) if the current
flowing through its Inductor il > 0 or it satisfy the
following condition
K > Kcrit (D)
where
K=

(a)

Fig. 1: A DC-DC Boost Converter Configuration.

All power electronics circuits and device are non-linear and
have varying characteristics with time and external conditions
i.e varying input voltage, effect of temperature on resistance
of elements (Capacitor series resistance, resistance of Switch,
load and inductor), Inductor is the most non-linear device
known and sudden change in the output load. Any one of
these makes it impossible to operate any DC-DC converter in
open loop. So, a controller has to be designed which takes a
reference voltage Vref and makes sure that that output of the
converter Vo follows the reference voltage Vref . The controller
achieves this by using either a voltage mode control[1] or
current mode control[2]. Using any of these allows to generate
PWM signal to drive the Power MOSFET and reach the
desired output voltage Vref .
Index TermsDC DC Boost Converter, Pulse Width Modulation(PWM), Continuous Conduction Mode (CCM), Closed loop
Transfer function, Lyapunov function, Linear and nonlinear
control, Voltage mode and Current mode control

II. S PECIFIC T ERMINOLOGIES

1) Boost Converter: It is a type of DC-DC converter
in which output voltage(Vo ) is equal to or more than
the applied input voltage(Vin )i.e Vo Vin and voltage
conversion ratio/Gain M(D) in terms of duty cycle is
given by
Vo
1
M (D) =
=
Vin
1D
where 0D1

2L
RTs

where L is Inductance of the inductor and R is Load

resistance and Kcrit (D) for Boost converter is
Kcrit (D) = D(1 D)2
4) Controller: The controller is the most important component of any DC-DC converter as it is used to makes sure
that output voltage Vo remains constant and follows the
reference signal Vref even when external conditions are
changing such as Change in Vin and load. It generates
an Output Signal Vc corresponding to error obtained by
the difference of Vref and Vo which is used to generate
Duty Cycle D using the PWM comparator.
5) PWM: Pulse Width Modulation(PWM) is a technique
used to obtain Duty Cycle signal D to drive the
Power MOSFET used in Boost Converter. It involves
Comparison of the Controller Output Signal Vc With
a fixed frequency and Amplitude sawtooth waveform
Vp (Sometime a triangular waveform is preferred as it
produces a better approximation of the Duty cycle D).
It follows a simple rule, for the time of signal
Vc > Vp
PWM comparator output will be one and for
Vc < Vp
it will be zero.

III. B OOKS
Power Electronics For Technology
Author(s): Ashfaq Ahmed Publisher: Prentice Hall
POWER ELECTRONICS DEVICES, CIRCUITS, AND
APPLICATIONS Third Edition
Author(s): Muhammad H. Rashid Publisher: ButterworthHeinemann
Description: In the two books mentioned above working
of DC-DC Boost Converter is explained and Gain/Voltage
conversion ratio in terms of Duty Cycle M (D) is derived.
Fundamentals of Power Electronics SECOND EDITION
Author(s): Robert W. Erickson, Dragan Maksimovic Publisher: KLUWER ACADEMIC PUBLISHERS
Description:Where as in this book Continuous Conduction
Mode (CCM) analysis of Boost Converter is explained using
the concept of Inductor Volt-Sec Balance, Capacitor ChargeSec Balance and Small Ripple Approximation. Also derivation
of Closed loop Transfer function of DC-DC Converters and
Linear output voltage mode of control is explained.
Nonlinear Systems Third EDITION
Author(s): Hassan K. Khalil Publisher: Prentice Hall
Description:In this book Nonlinear Control of systems
is introduced which includes concepts of feedback control
law, lyapunov function, passivity control and other important
nonlinear control techniques such as Back-stepping Control
adaptive mode and sliding mode control.

IV. C ONFERENCES

IEEE International Symposium on Industrial Electronics

IEEE European Conference on Power Electronics and
Applications
IEEE World Congress on Intelligent Control and Automation (WCICA)
IEEE EUROCON
V. J OURNALS

IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics

IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems
IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems
IET Power Electronics
International Journal of Engineering Trends and Technology
VI. I NFLUENTIAL AUTHORS

Few Influential Authors are mentioned below

1) Dr. Marian K. Kazimierczuk is with the Department
of Electrical Engineering at Wright State University,
Dayton, OH, where he is currently a Professor. His
research interests are in high-frequency high-efficiency
switching-mode tuned power amplifiers, resonant and
PWM dc/dc power converters, dc/ac inverters, highfrequency rectifiers and modeling and control of converters. He has published over 250 technical papers, 95 of
which have appeared in IEEE Transactions and Journals.
He also holds eight patents. Prof. Kazimierczuk received
the IEEE Harrell V. Noble Award for his contributions to

the fields of aerospace, industrial, and power electronics

in 1991. He serves as an Associate Editor the IEEE
TRANSACTIONS OF INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS
and the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CIRCUITS AND
SYSTEMSI: REGULAR PAPERS. He was and is a chair
of the CAS Technical Committee of Power Systems and
Power Electronics Circuits. He is a member of Tau Beta
Pi.
2) Hassan EL FADIL is Professor of Automatic Control
at Ibn Tofail University, Knitra, Morocco.His research
interests are Nonlinear Control, Power Conversion Systems, Distributed Energy Resources, Microgrid and
Smart Grid
3) Dr. Brad Bryant His research interests are in highfrequency resonant and PWM dc/dc power converters,
dc/ac inverters, high-frequency rectifiers, modeling and
control of converters, hi-fidelity vacuum tube audio
equipment, and power semiconductor devices.
VII. R ESEARCH G ROUPS
Some Research Groups working in this field are
1) Power Electronics Group
Research Area: To produce high gain DC-DC Boost
converters for Fuel Cells and for use in Transformerless UPS DC-AC inverter and other power devices.[3]
2) Power Conversion Group
Research Area: The Power Conversion Group is working
on developing a new power-dense converter which will
be small in size and light in weight using the latest power
electronic devices and high speed controllers for the
use in electrical system of aircraft, hybrid and Electric
vehicles, Fast Battery charging systems and PV grid
interface converters.[4]
3) Electrical Power group
Research Area: This group is working on a lot of different areas of Power Converter Control and Application
some of them are HVDC transmission, PWM and multilevel converters and use of advanced control techniques
for reduction of inductance of DC-DC converters. [5]
VIII. K EY R EFERENCE PAPERS
1) Analysis of Boost Converter Using PI Control
Algorithms,[1]
Description: Explains the method of controller design
using output voltage Vo as feedback and comparing it
to the reference voltage Vref . Error signal generated as
a result is feed to the PI controller which is tuned using
the Ziegler-Nichols method and loop sharing method and
the results (error in output voltage) are compared for
the generated PWM of both methods which drives the
MOSFET using a driver.
2) A PID Autotuning Method for Digitally Controlled dcdc Boost Converters,[6]
Description: Uses the similar technique as used by the
above research paper but instead of PI a digital PID
controller is used and the output voltage Vo is digitalized
using a ADC (Analog to Digital converter) and PID is

auto-tuned using DSP techniques (PID digital control

algorithm) which gives duty cycle D which is used to
drive the DPWM (Digital PWM) which is used to drive
the MOSFET using a driver(IC).
3) Voltage Loop of Boost PWM DCDC Converters With
Peak Current-Mode Control,[2]
Description: Uses two feedback loops output voltage
feedback and a Inductor current feedback. The controller
output Vc is generated using the output voltage Vo . The
inductor current il (Voltage equivalent to the current )
is compared to the Vc in the comparator and output of
which resets the SR-Latch if the il value is more than
the Vc (set input of SR latch is a clock of frequency
equal to sampling frequency). SR-latch output drives the
MOSFET.
4) Backstepping Based Control of PWM DC-DC Boost
Power Converters,[7]
Description: Introduces different non linear methods for
the control of DC-DC Boost converter, Direct output
Voltage regulation, Indirect output Voltage regulation
and Back-stepping adaptive controller design and all
these model use an averaged model of the converter and
transform it into some other coordinates (z =T(x)) which
are based on errors. Lyapunov fucntion corresponding
to the coordinates is designed and feedback control is
derived so that we get Vo .
IX. T IMELINES
1) How has the field developed over the years?
DC-DC Boost converter started with open loop converter
in which no feedback was used and the MOSFET was
driven directly using a clock/ some other fixed frequency
signal generating device but they were not efficient as
all power electronics circuits and devices are non linear
in nature. So without a controller and feedback DC-DC
converters have no use. Early control techniques used
output voltage as a feedback and after comparing it with
the desired/ reference voltage Vref , error is feed into
the controller to generate a Vc which is used to generate
PWM signal(Duty cycleD). Controller can be linear or
non linear. PI controller was the first linear controller
used to generate Vc [1], PI controller was Tuned using Ziegler-Nichols method and loop sharing methods.
Then PID controllers were used as the controller and
auto-tuning of its parameters was introduced [6]. After
that a new technique was introduced which used both
output voltage and input Inductor current as feedback
to generate PWM signal [2]. Non linear controllers are
relatively new and involves obtaining average model of
the converter, transforming it into new coordinates based
on errors and deriving Lyapunov function and feedback
control Law to minimize error it started with [7] Direct
Output Voltage regulation which was unsuccessful because of non-minimum phase nature of boost converter.
Indirect Output Voltage regulation was successful as
long as there was no change in the output load. Indirect
Output Voltage regulation forces il to approach a desired

value and uses this to force the output voltage Vo

to approach the desired Vref Both direct and indirect
approaches require a few design parameters to be tuned.
Similar results were obtained when using the Sliding
mode control[8]. All theses approaches work only when
the output load remains constant. If there is any change
in the load Vo will change drastically and will require retuning PI, PID and non linear design parameters everytime there is change in load which can happen at any
time. Back-stepping adaptive controller[7] is the best
technique so far because it introduces a parameter called
On-Line Load estimation which enables the design of
a controller which needs no design parameter re-tuning
every-time output load changes.
2) Which papers have had a large impact?
[2] Introduced the technique of using both Vo and il
as feedback and using Vo to derive Vc and il to derive
the PWM for the MOSFET by comparing it with Vc
(as explained in the section VIII 3). This paper gave
satisfactory results as long as load remained same. It
being a linear non adaptive controller took some time to
respond to change in load but when this same technique
of using two feedback loops was applied using a Backstepping adaptive controller the results were satisfactory
even when the load resistance varied.
3) Where is current research activity focused?
As I have explained in section VII that different research are working on making components of the Boost
converter lighter and smaller so they occupy less space
and they can be used for Hybrid and Electric cars
and transformer-less UPS [9](which are being made
currently but research is being carried out to make
them even smaller)[3] [4][8]. Researchers are working
on making converters more efficient by making the
lossy inductors induction small[5]. PV grid interface
converters are being implemented by a Research group
of COMSATS [10], they are going to use Solar panels
which can give 30-70V dc input and are going to use it
for battery charging (Buck Converter) and supplying it
to the houses in the rural areas by boosting the voltage
upto 350VDC and using inverter to convert it into
220VAC thereby using Boost converter as transformerless inverter[9].
R EFERENCES
[1] M. R. Dave and K.C.Dave, Analysis of boost converter using pi
control algorithms, International Journal of Engineering Trends and
Technology, vol. 3, 2012.
[2] B. Bryant and M. K. Kazimierczuk, Voltage loop of boost pwm dcdc
converters with peak current-mode control, IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON
CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMSI, vol. 53, no. 1, 2006.
[3] Power electronics group, university of padova, http://pelgroup.dei.
unipd.it/renewable/.
[4] Power
conversion
group,
university
of
manchester,
http://www.eee.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/research-groups/pc/
researchareas/powerelectronics/powerdenseconverters/.
[5] Electrical
power
research
group,
newcastle
university,
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/eee/staff/group/power/\\http://www.ncl.ac.uk/
eee/staff/profile/wuhaimeng.html.
[6] S. S. W. Stefanutti, P. Mattavelli and M. Ghioni, A pid autotuning
method for digitally controlled dc-dc boost converters, European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications, 2005.

[7] H. E. FADIL and F. GIRI, Backstepping based control of pwm dcdc boost power converters, in Industrial Electronics, 2007. ISIE 2007.
IEEE International Symposium on.
[8] D. F. Suresh Singh and V. Kumar, Robust sliding-mode control of dc/dc
boost converter feeding a constant power load, IET Power Electronics,
vol. 8, no. 1, 2015.
[9] E.-H. K. Jae-Kyu Park, Jung-Min Kwon and B.-H. Kwon, Highperformance transformerless online ups, IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON
INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, vol. 55, no. 8, 2008.
[10] Pv
grid
interface
converters,
http://ciit-atd.edu.pk/secure/
researchgroups/COMSATSProjectDetails.aspx?projectID=74&
GroupID=2&GroupName=High%20Voltage%20and%20Power%
20System&deptID=3.