| The design of dc-dc power converters is formulated as a multi-objective optimization problem, in which the objectives are to minimize the total converter mass and power loss. The design approach is demonstrated using buck converter modules as examples. The impacts of major converter components, including the energy storage inductor, output filter capacitor, semiconductor switching devices and associated heat sink are incorporated. To further alleviate the effect of large number of design parameters associated with the inductor HFMEC model, inductor meta-models representing the best design trade-off among the competing key inductor parameters, including dc winding resistance, incremental inductance, total power loss and mass, are derived as a set of analytic functions. The inductor meta-model also removes the iterative MEC solution algorithm from the main converter optimization loop. Two approaches to optimizing the converter are presented and compared in terms of dimensions of design search space, speed of convergence/simulation time, and consistency of the optimization results. |
