General Properties and Synthesis of Transformerless Stacked Active Bridge Converters

Transformerless stacked active bridge (TSAB) converters are hybrid dc-dc converters that combine features of switched capacitor (SC) and dual-active-bridge (DAB) converters, and can achieve very high efficiency near their nominal conversion ratio, together with regulation capability using simple phase-shift control. Following a network-theoretic approach, this paper describes a systematic procedure for synthesis of TSAB converters starting from two-phase SC converters such as ladder, Dickson, Fibonacci, and other SC topologies. Furthermore, the same approach yields general topology-dependant properties of TSAB converters, including steady-state characteristics and component stresses.