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A new bidirectional switch and snubber circuit are proposed for medium-voltage ac/ac converters. The proposed switch can be constructed using 2-in-1 insulated-gate bipolar transistor and 2-in-1 diode modules, and can reduce the voltage stress of the switching device by series connection. The proposed snubber configuration is very simple and can regenerate absorbed energy. On the other hand, timing errors in the switching between the series-connected switches cause a voltage imbalance in the snubber circuit. Therefore, a simple method is proposed for reducing the voltage imbalance that uses one voltage sensor for each switch circuit. This proposed method controls the snubber voltages by adjusting the switch timings. Furthermore, application of the proposed switch circuit to a matrix converter is discussed and is confirmed by experiment. Index Terms--AC/AC converter, matrix converter, medium-voltage converter, series connection, snubber circuit.

This paper proposes a novel circuit topology for a three-phase power factor correction (PFC) rectifier using a harmonics current injection method. In consideration of lower cost, the harmonics injection method is more suitable than a conventional six-arm pulse width modulation (PWM) rectifier. The harmonics injection current is simply generated by only one switching leg. As a result, the proposed circuit has the advantage of only two switches. An optimal injection current is achieved in order to obtain an input current of sinusoidai waveforms. This paper discusses the basic operation and optimal design method for the proposed circuit. In addition, the validity of the proposed circuit is confirmed by simulation and experimental results. An input current of almost sinusoidal waveform was obtained and an input current total harmonic distortion (THD) of 8.5% was obtained at a load of approximately 1 kW. Index Terms--AC-DC power conversion, converters, harmonic distortion, power conversion harmonics, power quality, rectifiers.

While the matrix converter has many advantages that include bidirectional power flow, a size reduction, a long lifetime, and sinusoidal input currents, it is vulnerable to the input voltage disturbances, because it directly exchanges the input voltage to the output voltage. The instantaneous effective power control (IEPC) method has been proposed to compensate the input voltage disturbances, in which the instantaneous effective power is kept constant by controlling input current. However, to date, no method has been proposed to maintain the stability of the system with the IEPC. The purpose of this paper is to propose a method to control the stability of the system with IEPC. First, this paper explains the IEPC theoretically. Next, a model of the system with the IEPC is developed, and stability analyses are conducted. Then, based on the results of the analyses, a stability control method for the system with the IEPC is proposed. Furthermore, the validities of the proposed method are demonstrated by simulation and experiments. Finally, a restart performance of the system after momentary power interruption is discussed. Because the IEPC does not need phase-locked-loop to detect the phase angle of the input voltage, fast restart is expected. Index Terms--Instantaneous effective power control (IEPC) method.

This paper proposes a novel control strategy and a protection circuit and shows the advantage of utilizing a newly developed reverse blocking insulated gate bipolar transistor (RBIGBT), to solve several practical problems of the matrix converter. The proposed control strategy is based on a virtual indirect control method with a virtual rectifier and a virtual inverter. Pulse-width modulated (PWMI pulses for the matrix converter are obtained by combining PWM pulses for the virtual rectifier and inverter. As a result, the control part of the input current and output voltage can be clearly separated. Thus, the conventional inverter control algorithms can be applied to the virtual inverter control. The advantage of this method is confirmed by experimental results with a 22-kW induction motor drive system. Good sinusoidal waveforms are obtained for the input and output currents, and the total harmonic distortion (THD) of the input and output current are 5.1% and 1.4%, respectively. The conduction loss of the RB-IGBT is decreased to about two-thirds of the conventional ac switch with series connection diode. Thus, the converter loss is about a half to the conventional PWM rectifier-inverter system with the same capacity. Furthermore, the protection problem is solved by a dynamic clamp method without an electrolytic capacitor. This protection circuit directly dissipates reactive load energy by dynamic clamp operation of an IGBT. Index Terms--Pulse-width modulated (PWM) rectifier-inverter system, reverse blocking IGBT (RB-IGBT).

This paper proposes two novel circuits which realize a unity input power factor single-phase to three-phase converter with a motor load. The power supply is connected to the neutral point of the motor, and the three-phase inverter is controlled to act also as a virtual ac/dc converter leg. This virtual leg is controlled by zero vectors of the three-phase inverter. The main features of these circuits are as follows. * No inductive components are required. * A reduction in the number of switching devices compared with conventional topologies. * Motor current increases because converter input current also flows through the motor windings. A full-bridge converter can be built using the same number of switching devices as the conventional half bridge and with no need for a capacitive leg with an accessible neutral point. In this paper, the proposed full-bridge-type circuit is experimentally tested using a 750-W induction motor as load. Index Terms--High-power converter, input harmonics, three-phase inverter, zero-phase-sequence, zero-vector.