ET4382 Power conversion techniques in CMOS technology

Topics: This course teaches you how to design class D audio amplifiers, inductive and capacitive DC-DC converters in CMOS technology.

No modern electronic system could work without power conversion technology. For instance, a laptop, a mobile phone, or an electric car has only one battery, which offers only one supply voltage. However, there are thousands of sub-circuits in these devices, analog and digital, high voltage and low voltage, CMOS and bipolar, and they require various supply voltages to operate properly. How to generate different supplies efficiently and accurately for these sub-circuits is a crucial and challenging task. This course will cover the most common DC-DC power conversion techniques, starting from the simplest resistor diver, to more sophisticated voltage regulator such as LDOs, switched-capacitor DC-DC converter and inductive DC-DC converter (buck converter).

In addition, basics of class D power amplifiers will be introduced in this course, which shares similar principle as a buck converter. A class D power amplifier converts power from a DC supply to a high energy (>1W) AC audio signal, which can be found in a lot of headphones and high-end sound systems.

Learning objectives

  • Understanding the basic working principle of a switched-capacitor DC-DC converter
  • Understanding the basic working principle of a buck converter
  • Understanding negative feedback loops in DC-DC converters
  • Understanding the basic working principle of a class D power amplifier

Teachers

dr.ir. Qinwen Fan (ECTM)

high-performance class D audio amplifiers; smart power inverters in wide bandgap semiconductors, low-power DC-DC converters for energy harvesters; low-power circuits for IoT nodes.

Last modified: 2023-11-04

Details

Credits: 3 EC
Period: 0/0/3/0
Contact: Qinwen Fan