Zero-voltage-switching high frequency inverter for electrodeless fluorescent lamp

Driving the electrodeless fluorescent lamp, the high AC voltage with high frequency is required. The linear power amplifier has been widely used as a driving circuit of electrodeless fluorescent lamp. However, the low efficiency of the power amplifier causes the driving circuit to be replaced by a PWM switching inverter. In order to use a PWM switching inverter as the driving circuit of an electrodeless fluorescent lamp the high switching frequency is required. But due to the switching loss at switches of the inverter, the limitation of high switching frequency appeals in the inverter. One solution to this limitation is to reduce the switching loss by using the zero voltage switching technique. In this paper, the zero-voltage-switching resonant inverter for driving an electrodeless fluorescent lamp is discussed. The results of analysis about the inverter are presented and the equations for analyzed results are verified through the experiment.