A thermodynamic approach to energy conversion in parametric transformers

The aim of the paper is to present a thermodynamic approach to the theory of the energy conversion in inductive parametric devices. An inductive parametric converter, also named parametric transformer (PT), is a static electromagnetic device made by two nonlinear inductors having zero mutual inductance. The coupling of the constitutive equations, needed by the conversion process, is due to the nonlinearity of the magnetic medium. The nature of the parametric coupling is discussed. A key nonlinear equivalent network of the parametric transformer is proposed and both the constitutive equations and the internal energy are expressed. The generalized Carnot cycle is introduced to evaluate and discuss both the transferred work and the thermodynamic efficiency of the parametric conversion process.