Design Rules for Aperiodic Boost Converters

Oliver Woywode, Henry Güldner, Alexander L. Baranovski*, Wolfgang Schwarz*

Elektrotechnisches Institut
Institut für Grundlagen der Elektrotechnik und Elektronik*
Technische Universität Dresden, D-01062 Dresden, Germany
Phone: ++49351463 4087; E-Mail: woywode@ieee.org

Abstract of these systems may be investigated by using their

The paper deals with a current programmed boost
converter. The PWM boost converter may oper-
ate aperiodically (chaotically) while maintaining
continuous-conduction mode. Simple analytical ex-
pressions for the inductor current ripple and the
capacitor voltage ripple are presented. The expres-
sions are valid for both periodic and aperiodic oper-
ation mode. Conservation of the inductor's stored
energy in both type of operations is compared.
A trade-o between periodic and aperiodic opera-
tion is proposed. Impacts on semiconductor device
stress and on meeting electromagnetic interference
issues are suggested.
I Introduction
Aperiodic operation of DC-DC converters has re-
cently attracted some attention [2, 4, 8]. Random-
ized or chaotic modulation schemes that cause this
type of operation are able to reduce the peaks of
the switching harmonics. This is important since
all electrical and electronic devices in the Euro-
pean Community have to meet strong electromag-
netic interference (EMI) requirements. The spec-
ied EMI regulations actually favour broadband
spectra over sequences of peak harmonics. The
idea of operating DC-DC converters chaotically
was proposed since spectral spreading comes nat-
urally with chaos [3]. Lower spectral peaks reduce
lter eorts. No additional circuitry is needed. The
advantage with respect to size and cost is evident.
The control implementation is at least as simple as
in the periodic case. Actually, in the case of a cur-
rent programmed boost converter it is even simpler
as the stabilizing ramp does not need to be imple-
mented.
DC-DC converters belong to the class of contin-
uous systems with discrete control. The dynamics
embedded discrete return maps. These maps may
possess an invariant density. This density is crucial
for the dynamics of the converter and may be cal-
culated by means of a statistical analysis [1, 2, 6].
Statistical analysis has been regarded as a feasi-
ble tool in Power Electronics [1, 5, 6, 7]. This paper
derives design rules based on statistical analysis for
a chaotic boost converter. The expressions may be
used for selecting appropriate capacitor and induc-
tor values for a desired ripple. Trade-os between
periodic and aperiodic behavior of a DC-DC con-
verter are suggested.
The paper is organized as follows: In Section II
the boost converter used throughout this paper is
introduced and its embedded return map is de-
rived. Section III and Section IV analyze the induc-
tor current and the capacitor voltage ripple, respec-
tively. Section V deals with the energy conservation
of the inductor.
II Boost Converter
Fig. 1 shows the current programmed PWM boost
converter used to verify the analytical results. The
primary control variable is the reference current
Ir . By changing this parameter while keeping the
load resistance constant i. e., changing the conver-
sion voltage ratio, the converter may operate chaot-
ically. Chaotic behavior is typical for DC-DC con-
verters under current-mode control for a duty cycle
larger than one half. Traditionally, this behavior
has been regarded as unstable. It was consequently
prevented by a stabilizing ramp in the inner current
loop. This paper omits the ramp in the analysis and
in the practical design.
Practically, the reference variable is adjusted by
a voltage feedback loop. As the dynamic of this
feedback is slow compared to the frequency of
 L D i(t)

Vi
i(t)
S C Vo R Ir

In In+1
Q T
+
T T
Ir , R S clock

Figure 1: Boost converter. [R] = 92

, [Vi ] = 10 V, tn tn
0

[T ] = 100 s, [L] = 1 mH, [C ] = 0:32 mF. t

the switching process, Ir will be assumed constant 2n 2n+1 2(n+1)

throughout this paper. As long as the switch is Figure 2: Waveform of boost's input current in
closed the inductor current i(t) increases linearly continuous-conduction mode.
until it reaches Ir . All clock pulses are ignored dur-
ing this time. The switch opens and the current de-
creases until the next clock pulse causes the switch
to close. The Rényi Map has an invariant density which may
Assuming a constant output voltage the input be calculated using the Frobenius-Perron-Operator
current is given by [1]. This density is crucial as it determines the evo-
( lution of the inductor current samples In via the
I n + c1 (t , 2n ) 2n < t < 2n+1 ; map. All relevant properties of the current may
i(t) =
Ir + c2 (t , 2n+1 ) 2n+1 < t < 2(n+1) ; be expressed with respect to the embedded return
(1) map. The boost converter operates chaotically for
all  larger than one [1].
where the slopes c1 and c2 are
c1 = VLi ; c2 = Vi ,L Vo : (2) III Inductor Current Ripple
The current waveform is depicted in Fig. 2 indicat- According to Fig. 2 and (3) the peak-to-peak in-
ing continuous-conduction mode. Using the follow- ductor current ripple for the aperiodic case may be
ing relations illustrated in Fig. 2 dened during any on-interval tn as
tn = Txn; In = Ir , c1 tn ; (3)
in = Ir , In = c1 tn = c1 Txn: (7)
tn = T (1 , xn mod 1) ; In+1 = Ir + c2 tn ; (4)
0 0

Obviosly, the current ripple changes chaotically

the one-dimensional discrete return map embedded
in the dynamical system may be derived as
xn+1 = g (xn ) =  (1 , xn mod 1) : (5)
The map approximates the dynamics of the con-
verter suciently. This result has already been re-
ported in [1, 2]. g(xn ) is the Rényi Map.  is the
bifurcation parameter. It denes the input-output
voltage ratio
 = VVo , 1:
i moments of the map may be calculated analytically
with In and therefore with xn as well. In order
to select an appropriate inductor value the math-
ematical expectation E (
) of
in is used to obtain
the mean ripple
ic

ic = E (
in ) = c1 T E (xn ) = c1 Tm1()
(8)
 21 c1 T:
The statistics of xn are known [1]. m1 () is the
(6) rst moment of the map (5). As shown in [1], the
for integer  The peak-to-peak inductor current ripple for the
mk () = E xkn = k + 1 ; k = 1; 2 : : : : (9) d
,
k
Accordingly, the rst moment is: m1 () = =2. As
illustrated in Fig. 3, (9) yields also a good approx-
imation for all  larger than the golden mean 0
p comparison with (8). Substituting =2 for m1 ()
0 = 2 5  1:618:
1 + (10)
Fig. 3 compares the exact numerical computation
2
m1 ()
=2
1.5
m1 ()
1
0.5
1 2 3 4
Figure 3: Comparison of m1 () and =2.
of m1 () and the integer solution of (9). For   0
all points within the interval (0; ) of the bifurca-
tion diagram are visited upon iteration [1]. This is
the underlying reason that (9) provides a good ap-
proximation for arbitrary  larger than the golden
mean.
According to Fig. 2 the peak-to-peak inductor
current ripple may also be dened for any o-
interval tn as 0 operation.

in = Ir , In+1 = ,c2 tn = ,c2 T E (xn+1 )
0
(11)
= c1 Tm1():
This coincides with (8). The input-output voltage
ratio for a certain application denes , thus m1 ()
is xed. From (8) or (11) the inductance L may
then be chosen to meet a desired mean ripple.
In order to compare (8) with the periodic ripple
a signal generator was directly connected to the
active switch. Thus, there is no feedback and hence
no chaos. The duty cycle has been adjusted such
as to produce the same output voltage as in the
aperiodic case.
periodic case may be expressed using the duty cycle

ip = c1 Td = c1 T 1 +  : (12)
The duty cycle has been written in terms of  in the
last term of the right hand side in order to ease the
in (8) and comparing with (12), it is apparent that
8 > 1 :
ic >
ip as 2 > 1 +  : (13)
Therefore the current ripple in the chaotic case is
larger than in the periodic case. In fact, the upper
limit Ir in the chaotic case is permanently larger
than Ir from the periodic case. While the expecta-
tion of the lower limit E (In ) is smaller than its peri-
odic counterpart. Fig. 4 compares the ripple values
2
=2
=(1 + )
aper
1.5 peri

i=A
1
0.5
1 2
3 4
Figure 4: Comparison of calculated (dashed and
dotted line) and measured (plus and star) peak-
to-peak current ripple for aperiodic and periodic
from the analytical expressions and from measure-
ments for the periodic and the aperiodic case. The
agreement between the theoretical expressions in
(8) and (12) and measurements for each case is
satisfactory. The only remarkable discrepancy oc-
curs for small . This is because for  smaller than
the golden mean the approximation m1 ()  =2
is rather crude.
A practical note regarding the measurements: It
is dicult to measure the expectation value of In
precisely. The digital oscilloscope used 30 samples
of In to compute E (In ). This procedure showed
good agreement with the approximate theoretical
value Ir , c1 T=2 except for small  where the 0.4

same argument as above applies. The measured rip-

ple indicated by a plus sign in Fig. 4 is the dier- (1 + )=2

ence between the measured Ir and the 30-sample- 0.3
aper
average of In . peri
A larger current ripple may not be desirable at

v=V
rst sight. There are advantages, however. Our 0.2

measurements indicate that the lower value of

E (In ) causes a signicant reduction of the diode's
maximum repetitive reverse current. This in turn 0.1

eases the stress on the active switch during com-

mutation. It further improves the electromagnetic
compatibility (EMC) as the voltage peak caused 0
1 2 3 4

by the reverse recovery process of the diode is re- 

duced. This comes as an additional benet to the
already improved EMC of chaotic converters due Figure 5: Comparison of calculated (dashed and
to the reduced spectral peaks [1, 3]. dotted line) and measured (plus and star) peak-
Due to the larger chaotic ripple the active switch to-peak voltage ripple for aperiodic and periodic
has to turn o higher currents. This may be accept- operation.
able as the converter runs slower and switching oc-
curs less frequently. On the other hand the current
ripple in (8) can be reduced by increasing the clock The same discussion as for the current ripple ap-
frequency, thereby reducing T . This may not im- plies here as well. The voltage ripple in the chaotic
pose signicantly more stress on the active switch case is larger than in the periodic one. This may be
as the chaotic mode slows down the converter any- an intuitive result as well. Aperiodic operation in-
way. troduces all frequency components. Specically the
low frequency components will not be removed by
IV Capacitor Voltage Ripple the capacitor to a certain extent. They show up at
the output and increase the ripple. Increasing the
In analogy to the current ripple the capacitor peak- capacitance reduces the voltage ripple easily. As for
to-peak voltage ripple for the chaotic case may be the current ripple increasing the clock frequency is
expressed during any on-interval tn by another viable option.
Vo E (t ) = Vo Tm (): (14)

vc = E (vn ) = CR n
CR 1 V Inductor Energy Balance
Substituting (6) for Vo and =2 for m1 () in (14) The energy stored in the inductor during any on-
leads to interval is
ViT 

vc  CR (1 + ) 2 : (15) Ztn
Wn = Vi (In + c1 t) dt
+

For the periodic case the capacitor voltage ripple 0 (17)

 
may be dened as 1
= Vi T Ir xn , 2 c1 Tx2n :
V V oT  V

vp = CR Td = CR 1 +  = CR : (16)
o iT

The expectation of Wn+ matters

In the aperiodic case the voltage ripple depends
quadratically on  while there is a linear depen- Wc = E (Wn+ )
 
dence in the periodic case. Fig. 5 compares the 1 m2 () c T
= Vi Tm1 () Ir , (18)
measured chaotic voltage ripple with (15). The de- 2 m1 () 1

viation, most notably in the aperiodic case, is due = Vi Tm1()E [i(t)] :

to neglecting of all parasitic eects (such as copper
losses of the inductance) in the statistical analysis. The right-hand equality in (18) has been shown in
Apart from this the agreement is satisfactory. [1]. The expectation of i(t) is the DC value of the
boost's input current. The energy delivered from References
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0 holm, Denmark, July 1517, pages 7780, 1999.
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This paper applied a statistical approach to ana- dc-dc converters under current-mode control.
lyze a current programmed boost converter. The- In Power Electronics Specialists' Conference,
oretical results based on this approach were vali- PESC'96, Baveno, Italy, June, pages 1477
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duction due to less lter eorts.

Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge Hajo Sgam-
lin's assistance with experimental setup and mea-
surements.