IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO.

11, NOVEMBER 2012 4503

Framework and Topology for Active Tuning
of Parallel Compensated Receivers in
Power Transfer Systems
Zeljko Pantic, Student Member, IEEE, and Srdjan M. Lukic, Member, IEEE
AbstractWireless power transfer (WPT) based on magnetic
coupling is becoming widely accepted as a means of transferring
power over small to medium distances. An unresolved issue is the
source and receiver resonance matching in multireceiver systems
where the source operating frequency adjustment is not possible.
This paper presents a framework to analyze the effect of parallel-
compensated receiver detuning on the power transfer in WPT sys-
tems. Building on this analytical study, we present a new receiver
design for WPT systems. The proposed design combines a parallel
compensated resonant tank with a tristate boost converter. By syn-
chronizing the tristate boost switching period with the half-period
of the resonant tank voltage, we position the inherently discontinu-
ous current pulse drawn by the tristate boost to control both active
and reactive power ows from the resonant circuit. Controllable
reactive current can be used effectively to emulate appropriate
inductance or capacitance to tune the resonant tank and achieve
optimal power transfer.
Index TermsElectromagnetic coupling, parallel compensation,
real-time receiver tuning, tristate boost, wireless power transfer
(WPT).
I. INTRODUCTION
W
IRELESS power transfer (WPT) is an effective method
to power inaccessible loads or loads operating in hos-
tile environments [1][7]. The basic WPT system consists of a
source and a receiver coil coupled by the magnetic eld pro-
duced by the source. To increase the power transfer, resonating
compensators are used to boost the voltage and/or current in both
the source and receiver coil. Typical system layout is shown in
Fig. 1. Most practical WPT receiver designs make use of a sim-
ple series or parallel compensation [8], though more complex
topologies have been proposed [3], [9][11]. Parallel compen-
sation is most widely used in practice due to its voltage boosting
property and inherent current limiting capability [1], [8].
Power transfer in WPT systems degrades when the source
and receiver resonant frequencies do not match. This frequency
mismatch is a result of resonant tank component parameter
Manuscript received September 15, 2011; revised February 1, 2012; ac-
cepted March 12, 2012. Date of current version June 20, 2012. The ERC shared
facilities used in this work was supported by the National Science Foundation
under Award EEC-0812121. Recommended for publication by Associate Editor
Y.-F. Liu.
The authors are with the North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North
Carolina, NC 27607 USA (e-mail: zpantic@ncsu.edu; smlukic@ncsu.edu).
Color versions of one or more of the gures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identier 10.1109/TPEL.2012.2196055
Fig. 1. Structure of the WPT system (Comp. = compensation).
Fig. 2. Simplied model of a parallel compensated receiver.
variations with temperature and age or the presence of nearby
conductive objects. Source/receiver frequency mismatch is es-
pecially problematic for systems with a highly selective (high
Q) resonant tank resulting in a large drop in the delivered
power [12]. In multireceiver systems, the source coil current
magnitude and frequency must be kept constant to ensure rated
power delivery to all receivers within the system design space.
Therefore, in multireceiver systems, frequency matching of
source and receiver resonances can be guaranteed only by active
tuning of the receiver resonant frequency.
To achieve resonant frequency control of the parallel com-
pensated receivers, researchers proposed adding discrete tuning
capacitors in [13]. A more exible approach uses a variable
inductor [10] or a capacitor [2] in parallel with the parallel-
compensated receiver coil (see Fig. 2). Variable inductors and
capacitors can be implemented by using bidirectional switches
to control the reactance injection in each half-period of resonant
tank operation. The main disadvantages of systems presented
in [2] and [10] are 1) need for additional passive element(s);
2) use of bidirectional switches; 3) xed compensation capa-
bility dened by passive element reactance; and 4) inherent
single-direction tuning capability [3].
0885-8993/$31.00 2012 IEEE
4504 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012
In [1], [3], and [9], researchers have investigated tuning meth-
ods for LCL compensation on the receiver. In [3], researchers
propose to control the variable inductance in series with the LC
tank to tune the system. In general, a receiver resonant tank with
more than two elements suffers from: 1) larger reactive power
requirements for the combined passive elements; 2) the need for
complex nonlinear control [3]; 3) unknown power transfer capa-
bility limitations due to the onset of frequency bifurcation [14];
and 4) complex transient response to fast changes in magnetic
coupling or loading [9].
In [15], the authors presented a tristate boost-based re-
ceiver topology that can be used to adaptively tune a parallel-
compensated WPT receiver. This study builds on the concept
to develop a framework for analyzing the degree of detuning
of parallel-compensated receivers. We introduce a dimension-
less quantity that uniquely denes the effect of detuning on the
power transfer. Based on the analytical derivation, we analyze
the performance of an unregulated receiver, a receiver equipped
with a standard boost, and a receiver equipped with a tristate
boost. We show that the standard boost topology has the ability
to counter the effect of detuning by changing the reected re-
sistance into the resonant tank. For the case of the tristate boost,
the additional degree of freedom is used to inject an equal and
opposite reactance into the resonant tank to retune the system,
thus allowing the systemto deliver the nominal power for higher
levels of detuning.
II. GENERALIZED FRAMEWORK FOR QUANTIFYING THE
EFFECT OF PARALLEL COMPENSATED RECEIVERS
This section looks at the resulting power transfer when a par-
allel compensated receiver resonant frequency does not match
the incoming magnetic eld frequency. The parallel compen-
sated receiver can be modeled in a generalized way as shown
in Fig. 2. The resonant coil is symbolized by a voltage source
V
oc
in series with the self-inductance L
s
of the coil. The coil is
parallel compensated with a capacitor C
s
to form the resonant
tank. The operation of the receiver driver results in real power
transfer to the load represented by an equivalent resistance R
ac
,
and reected reactance C
ac
from the receiver driver onto the
resonant tank. The resonant tank reactance C
ac
can be a par-
asitic effect or can be injected and controlled as a part of the
system design. It can be positive (capacitive effect) or negative
(inductive effect), though we will refer to it as a capacitance
C
ac
.
As a side note, the receiver detuning will also affect the re-
ected impedance onto the source. The reected reactance from
a parallel-compensated receiver onto the WPT source is dened
in terms of normalized frequency in [11]. Essentially, depending
on the receiver loading and magnitude and direction of detuning
(i.e., inductive or capacitive), the reected impedance onto the
source will change as dened in [11]. In most practical sys-
tems, it is benecial to keep the receiver resonance at the same
frequency as the source to ensure that the system is operating
within the design parameters, while ensuring maximum power
transfer.
A. Power Delivery to a Tuned Rectier
For the perfectly tuned resonant tank, the natural undamped
resonant frequency
0
equals the incoming source eld fre-
quency
s
. If signal frequency
s
is constant, perfect tuning
can be achieved using different combination of C
s
and C
ac
. Let
us denote the value of capacitance C
s
that tunes circuit as C
s 0
(i.e., C
s
= C
s 0
and C
ac
= 0)

0
=
1

L
s
C
s0
. (1)
The receiver quality factor Q
s
is dened as
Q
s
=
R
ac
L
s

s
= C
s

s
R
ac
. (2)
The power delivery to the receiver can then be calculated as
P
r
= Q
s
I
sc
V
oc
(3)
where V
oc
=
s
MI
t
and I
sc
= V
oc
/
s
L
s
= I
t
M/L
s
. M is the
mutual inductance between the source and the receiver coils,
and I
t
is the current through the source coil.
In practice, in a dynamic environment it becomes very dif-
cult to ensure that
0
=
s
even if this condition was reached
at the start-up. Some of the typical sources of detuning are
1) variation of tuning capacitance C
s
with temperature or com-
ponent aging; 2) variation of inductance L
s
caused by the con-
ductive material in close proximity to the receiver (shielding
effect) [16]; and 3) change in the frequency of the magnetic
eld emitted by the source. Furthermore, because of tolerance
in capacitor manufacturing, it becomes difcult to perfectly tune
the receiver even during system commissioning. From the ana-
lytical point of view, all these sources have the same effect on
the receiver functionality. Therefore, without losing generality,
we will represent any deviation from resonance as variation in
the compensation capacitor C
s
.
B. Effect of Detuning on Power Transfer
Let us denote all variables which correspond to perfectly
tuned case (C
s
= C
s 0
) with 0 in the subscript: P
ac0
, V
oc0
,
R
ac0
, etc. In addition, let us use variables normalized to the
corresponding tuned value as described in (4)(8)

R
=
R
ac
R
ac0
(4)

Cs
=
_
C
s
C
s0
_
1 (5)

Cac
=
C
ac
C
s0
(6)

V
=
V
ac
V
ac0
(7)

P
=
P
ac
P
ac0
. (8)
PANTIC AND LUKIC: FRAMEWORK AND TOPOLOGY FOR ACTIVE TUNING OF PARALLEL COMPENSATED RECEIVERS 4505
Fig. 3. Unregulated receiver with a second-order lter at the output.
The resonant tank voltage variation
V
can be then calculated
from Fig. 3 as

V
=

V
oc0
/
_
1 + s(L
s
/R
ac
) + s
2
L
s
(C
s
+ C
ac
)
_

V
oc0
Q
s0
|
s=j
=
1
Q
s0
_
(1
2
s
L
s
(C
s
+ C
ac
))
2
+ (
2
s
(L
s
/R
ac
))
2
. (9)
For
s
=
0
, (1) is valid, and (9) can be rewritten as

V
=
1
Q
s0
_
(
Cs
+
Cac
)
2
+ (1/
R
Q
s0
)
2
. (10)
Relative change in delivered power can be described as

P
=

2
V

R
=
1

R
Q
2
s0
_
(
Cs
+
Cac
)
2
+ (1/
R
Q
s0
)
2
_.
(11)
Equations (10) and (11) show that the normalized values of
the resonant voltage
V
and transferred power
P
are not only
functions of relative circuit detuning, but that this effect is mag-
nied by Q
s 0
. The same is true for relative synthetized reac-
tance
Cac
. Therefore, we introduce two newvariables, called
tuning and detuning factors

t
= Q
s0

Cac
(12)

d
= Q
s0

Cs
. (13)
Substituting (12) and (13) into (10) and (11) yields

V
=
1
_
(
d
+
t
)
2
+ (1/
R
)
2
(14)

P
=
1

R
(
d
+
t
)
2
+ (1/
R
)
. (15)
From (15), it is apparent that the power delivered to the receiver
will be reduced when
d
increases. In addition, the power trans-
fer will drop precipitously for larger values of Q
s 0
, even for a
small capacitor deviation. This is the one of the reasons why
most practical WPT systems operate at moderate quality fac-
tors. Based on (15), power transfer can be maintained either by
compensating for the detuning with equal and opposite tuning
factor
t
or by changing the value of the normalized resistance

R
. In the next section, we will introduce three topologies with
different inherent abilities to compensate for detuning.
Fig. 4. Receiver equipped with a standard boost.
Fig. 5. Proposed parallel compensated pickup with tristate boost.
III. COMPARISON OF PARALLEL COMPENSATED
RECEIVER DESIGNS
This section compares three topologies with different abilities
to compensate for receiver detuning: receiver with no regulation
of power ow (see Fig. 3), receiver equipped with a boost con-
verter (see Fig. 4), and receiver equipped with a tristate boost
(see Fig. 5). The rst two topologies are standard implementa-
tions of parallel compensated receivers. The use of the tristate
boost as a WPT receiver driver was rst proposed by the au-
thors in [15]. Previously, the tristate boost has been used for
dc/dc power conversion [17], [18] to improve the controller per-
formance by eliminating a right-half-plane zero present in the
boost transfer function. While noting that the other two topolo-
gies are its subsets, we describe the operation of the tristate
boost in detail.
A. Tristate Boost Principle of Operation
The proposed topology, shown in Fig. 5, consists of a parallel
compensated receiver coil, a diode bridge rectier, and a tristate
boost. The modes of operation for the tristate boost are shown in
Fig. 6. The rst two modes, namely, boost and power delivery
to the load are classical boost converter modes of operation,
representing the energizing of the inductor (boost: s
b
ON, s
f
OFFinterval D
b
T
s
) and the power delivery to the load and
capacitor C
f
(power delivery: s
b
OFF, s
f
OFFinterval D
o
T
s
).
Freewheeling period is dened as the operating mode when the
switch s
f
is turned ON (s
f
ON, s
b
OFFinterval D
f
T
s
). In this
mode, current ows in the inductor, but no current is drawn
from the rectier. In the proposed system, the tristate boost
switching period is synchronized with the half-period of the
resonant tank voltage V
ac
. By adjusting the freewheeling interval
D
f
, the tristate boost is able to emulate additional reactance
symbolized in Fig. 2 with C
ac
and use the other two modes to
emulate the required R
ac
. It is important to underline that the
4506 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012
Fig. 6. Operation of three-state boost.
circuit is able to emulate an inductor when the freewheeling
period precedes the boost and power delivery modes in the half-
period. In this case, C
ac
will be negative.
The proposed topology essentially provides a method to con-
trol the receiver resonant frequency and match it to the source
coil frequency. The discontinuous current drawn by the tristate
boost converter is proled to inject a reactance into the resonant
tank and therefore ensure that the receiver coil resonant tank
frequency matches the frequency of the magnetic eld emitted
by the source coil. It is important to note that the boost con-
verter in discontinuous conduction mode (DCM) also has the
same three operating modes as the tristate boost. However, us-
ing the boost converter in DCM to inject reactive power and
control the power delivery presents the following problems:
1) rectier current will have substantial high-order harmonics
that will be injected into the resonant tank, and, further, back
into the source coil; 2) it is very difcult to determine the appro-
priate positioning of the pulse that guarantees both the correct
reactive power injection and appropriate real power delivery to
the load; and 3) traditional issues with operating the boost con-
verter in DCM still exist, for example excessive switch stress
and poor switch utilization. It is also important to note that we
assume the tristate boost inductor current is always continuous.
Accepting typical simplications (losses in the rectier and
switching converter, harmonic distortion of I
ac
and V
ac
, and
harmonics of rectied voltage V
dc
), the action of rectier and
converter can be modeled and replaced with an equivalent resis-
tor R
ac
and C
ac
(see Fig. 2). The derivation of R
ac
and C
ac
for a
tristate boost converter is given in the Appendix. The standard
boost converter operation can be derived directly from the tris-
tate boost operation by setting D
f
= 0, while the unregulated
second-order lter design operation stems from the standard
boost when D
b
= 0. The values of R
ac
and C
ac
for the three dif-
ferent topologies under investigation are summarized in Table I.
B. Power Delivery Capabilities in Face of Detuning for the
Analyzed Topologies
Based on the results summarized in Table I, the power de-
livery capabilities for the three topologies in Figs. 35 can be
evaluated. First, the reected resistance and capacitance values
TABLE I
COMPARISON OF TUNING CAPABILITIES OF THREE ANALYZED TOPOLOGIES
[A = (1D
f
)]
TABLE II
NORMALIZED VOLTAGE AND POWER PARAMETERS FOR THE THREE ANALYZED
TOPOLOGIES [A = (1D
f
)]
Fig. 7. Normalized parameters of an unregulated receiver versus detuning
factor.
can be normalized to arrive at the parameters
R
and
t
. These
results are summarized in Table II. Based on these results, it is
apparent that the tristate boost is able to control both the tuning
factor
t
and the normalized reected resistance
R
, the boost
is able to control the normalized reected resistance
R
, while
the unregulated system does not have any kind of mechanism to
maintain power transfer in face of an increase in detuning factor

d
. This is demonstrated in Fig. 7, which shows variations of
the transferred power
P
and resonant voltage
V
as a function
of detuning factor
d
.
Unlike the unregulated case, the receiver equipped with a
standard boost will change the duty ratio D
o
to maintain the
voltage and power transfer unchanged. Depending on the degree
PANTIC AND LUKIC: FRAMEWORK AND TOPOLOGY FOR ACTIVE TUNING OF PARALLEL COMPENSATED RECEIVERS 4507
Fig. 8. Normalized parameters and duty cycle of a standard boost-equipped
receiver versus detuning factor.
of detuning, the value of D
o
will change according to

P
=
1

2
d
+ (1/
R
)
= 1. (16)
Although two solutions of (16) exist, only one converges
toward 1 (
R
1) when circuit approaches the perfectly tuned
operation (
d
0)

R
=
1
_
1 4
2
d
2
2
d
(for |
d
| 0.5) . (17)
From Table II and (17), the expression for D
o
becomes
D
o
= D
o0

R
= D
o0

1
_
1 4
2
d
2
2
d
(for |
d
| 0.5)
(18)
while the normalized voltage V
ac
becomes

V
=

R
=

1
_
1 4
2
d
2
2
d
(for |
d
| 0.5) .
(19)
Because (16) has real solutions only for
d
0.5, the boost
converter is able to keep constant voltage and output power for
a limited detuning range. When
d
> 0.5, the converter is no
longer capable of providing required output power. The con-
troller will continue to decrease the duty ratio D
b
until it nally
reaches zero conduction interval for an active switch, trying to
maximize conduction of the diode (D
o
= 1) and deliver max-
imum power to the load. In that case, the following equations
describe steady-state solution for discussed variables:

R
=
1
D
2
o0
(for |
d
| > 0.5) (20)

P
=
D
2
o0

2
d
+ D
4
o0
(for |
d
| > 0.5) (21)

V
=
1
_

2
d
+ D
2
o0
(for |
d
| > 0.5) . (22)
Previous discussions are illustrated in Fig. 8 for D
o 0
= 0.5 and
for the range of
d
from 1 to 1.
The advantage of three-state boost is one additional degree
of freedom in the form of the freewheeling duty cycle D
f
.
Fig. 9. Normalized parameters and duty cycles of a tristate boost-equipped
receiver verus detuning factor.
In implementing the tristate-boost controller, D
f
and D
o
are
controlled simultaneously to maintain the output dc voltage and
tune the resonant circuit [15]
1

R
(
d
+
t
)
2
+ (1/
R
)
= 1

d
+
t
= 0

R
= 1

t
=
d
.
(23)
By solving the last two equations with respect to D
o
and D
f
,
one can obtain
D
f
=
2

tan
1
(
d
) (24)
D
o
= D
o0
_
(1 (2/) tan
1
(
d
))
1 +
2
d
. (25)
From the analytical point of view, the tristate boost implemen-
tation does not have the limitations imposed by
d
.
Practically, a large value of D
f
puts a stress on the boost
switch by increasing the rms current [15]. It is interesting to
mention that tristate boost keeps constant values of resonant
circuit voltage V
ac
and resistance R
ac

V
=
R
= 1. (26)
Again, the obtained results are illustrated in Fig. 9 for D
o 0
=
0.5 and for the range of
d
from 1 to 1.
IV. IMPLEMENTATION OF POWER FLOW CONTROL FOR
TRISTATE BOOST
To verify the analytical results presented in the previous sec-
tions, a tristate boost controller was designed. The simplied
block diagram of the control algorithm is presented in Fig. 10.
It basically contains two parts: control algorithms for reac-
tive power ow control and real power control (output voltage
control algorithm). Control algorithms are implemented using
OPAL-RT hardware-in-the-loop.
A. Reactive Power Flow Control
As explained earlier, the objective of introducing the free-
wheeling period is to ensure that the incoming magnetic eld
and receiver resonant frequency match (i.e.,
s
=
0
). Our im-
plementation exploits the fact that for tuned conditions, open
4508 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012
Fig. 10. Block diagram of real and reactive power ow control.
circuit voltage of the receiver V
oc
leads the boosted resonant
tank voltage V
ac
by 90

. Therefore, when the resonant circuit

is tuned, the average of their product over an integral number
of periods gives zero. The applied integrator gives sufcient
bandwidth to compensate the slow dynamics of the detuning
processes. Measured V
ac
signal is used for synchronization of
the gate pulses G
f
and G
b
which is illustrated in Fig. 10 with
dashed lines entitled sync. Depending on the sign of the error
signal D
f ,sgn
, the free-wheeling interval D
f
is implemented at
the beginning of the switching interval (for D
f ,sgn
greater than
zero) or at the end of the interval (for D
f ,sgn
less than zero).
This effectively causes the rst harmonic of I
ac
current to lead
voltage V
ac
by D
f
/2 (former case) or lag the voltage by the
same angle (latter case).
B. Real Power Flow Control
In most applications, it is benecial to use a traditional con-
troller design rather than hysteretic control. Traditional control
results in easy EMI elimination due to the xed switching fre-
quency. The key point in developing the real power ow con-
troller is the derivation of the system transfer function that deals
with the complexity of the interaction between the ac reso-
nant tank and the dc/dc tristate boost. To deal with the circuit
complexity, we derive the dc-equivalent model of resonant tank
and bridge [19], [20]. Furthermore, the derivation of a small-
signal model is simplied by applying the unied signal ow
graph method described in [21] and [22]. In-depth description
of the derivation procedure for a large-signal model, a steady-
state model, and a small-signal model was presented in [15]. In
the same article, the nal form of the control-to-output trans-
fer function is given. The result is a controller design having a
250 Hz bandwidth with a minimum phase margin of 50

.
V. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
Experimental setup parameters are summarized in Table III,
while the physical setup is shown in Fig. 11. The experimental
results for the controller response to different state and param-
TABLE III
RECEIVER DESIGN PARAMETERS USED FOR EXPERIMENT
Fig. 11. Experimental setup; the distance between source and receiver coils
does not correspond to the actual measurements.
eter variations for the proposed algorithm are already presented
in [15] (including sudden variation in load R
L
, source coil cur-
rent I
t
, and compensation capacitor C
s
). Therefore, the experi-
mental results presented here focus on validating the steady-state
characteristics presented in Section II. Finally, we experimen-
tally compare the dynamic ability of the boost and tristate-boost
topologies to reject a disturbance in the form of a temporary
partial shielding of the receiver.
A. Operation of the Tristate Boost
Figs. 12 and 13 illustrate the basic concept of positioning the
diode bridge current pulse inside a half-period of the resonant
tank voltage V
ac
. Fig. 12 shows the system operation when the
resonant circuit is detuned by approximately 2.7%of C
s 0
. The
freewheeling controller creates leading current pulses (D
f, sgn
is
negative) and emulates the missing compensation capacitance.
At the same time, regulator H
c
(s) is able to keep output voltage
V
o
at the reference value (50 V).
Fig. 13 shows the same signals but after an additional capaci-
tance of 300 nF was connected in parallel to the resonant circuit.
This causes resonant tank detuning, this time due to overcom-
pensation (by about 5.4%), resulting in lower receiver resonant
frequency than that of the incoming magnetic eld. Now the
tristate boost action tunes the system by emulating an inductive
load. In Fig. 13, the gate pulse G
f
is positioned at the beginning
PANTIC AND LUKIC: FRAMEWORK AND TOPOLOGY FOR ACTIVE TUNING OF PARALLEL COMPENSATED RECEIVERS 4509
Fig. 12. Undercompensation operational conditions (C
s
< C
s 0
). Top trace:
output voltage V
o
(50 V/div); trace in the middle: gate signal G
f
(10 V/div);
lower traces: V
ac
(20 V/div) and I
ac
(5 A/div); time scale [4 s/div].
Fig. 13. Overcompensation operational conditions (C
s
> C
s 0
). Top trace:
output voltage V
o
(50 V/div); trace in the middle: gate signal G
f
(10 V/div);
lower traces V
ac
(20 V/div) and I
ac
[5 A/div]; time scale [4 s/div].
of V
ac
half-period (D
f ,sgn
is positive). The results are obtained
for the output load resistance R
L
= 25 .
B. Experimental Validation of Tuning Theory
To validate the analysis presented in Sections II and III, a set
of experiments was done using both the standard and tristate
boost receivers presented in Figs. 4 and 5, respectively. For con-
stant output load conditions (R
L
= 16 ), constant amplitude
of track current (I
t, max
= 13 A), and variable compensation ca-
pacitor, the steady-state shapes of signals V
ac
and I
ac
and values
of duty cycles D
o
and D
f
were recorded for both topologies.
Recorded signals V
ac
and I
ac
were postprocessed and the values
of R
ac
and P
ac
were obtained. To get the values of R
ac
, sig-
nals V
ac
and I
ac
are ltered and amplitudes of their extracted
rst harmonics are used for R
ac
calculation; averaging their
product over a period of input signal T
s
= 1/f
s
gives the value
of real power delivered to the power conditioner. The capaci-
Fig. 14. Duty cycles for standard and tristate boost versus detuning factor.
Fig. 15. Normalized power P
ac
, resonant voltage V
ac
, and resistance R
ac
versus detuning factor for a receiver equipped with a standard boost.
Fig. 16. Normalized power P
ac
, resonant voltage V
ac
, and resistance R
ac
versus detuning factor for a receiver equipped with a tristate boost.
tance C
s 0
which tunes the resonant circuit was obtained exper-
imentally as C
s 0
= 3.68 F. The compensation capacitor value
was then varied from approximately 83% to 117% of C
s 0
by
adding or removing capacitors fromthe capacitor bank. For each
value of C
s
, converters are tested and the results are presented
in Figs. 1416.
Fig. 14 presents the duty cycles generated by the controller
and analytically derived values for the two topologies: stan-
dard and tristate boost. Experimental results for the normalized
power
P
are in good agreement with theory derived in (16) and
4510 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012
(23). For a fair comparison, in Fig. 14 we use scaled measure-
ments of P
ac0
since the analytical derivation assumes idealized
components, while the actual system has an efciency of about
80%. The efciency loss can be accounted for in (16) and (23)
by multiplying the right side of equations with 1/
0
where
0
represents efciency for an ideally tuned receiver (
d
= 0) ob-
tained experimentally. Modied (16) and (23) are rewritten here
for completeness
1

2
d
+ (1/
R
)
=
1

0
(27)
1

R
(
d
+
t
)
2
+ (1/
R
)
=
1

0
. (28)
Although a better correspondence between measured and calcu-
lated results can be obtained if the equations are modied with
actual efciency values for each specic detuning circumstance,
it turns out that even this simple modication is sufcient, es-
pecially for standard boost whose efciency is almost constant.
Basically, through this replacement, the equations give the so-
lution for the case when the converter input power is 1/ times
higher, which indirectly takes into account losses in the con-
verter
D
o,2-state
= D
o0

R
= D
o0

0

_

2
0
4
2
d
2
2
d

_
for |
d
|

0
2
_
(29)
D
f
=
2

tan
1
_

0
_
(30)
D
o,3-state
= D
o0
_
(1 (2/) tan
1
(
d
/
0
))
1 +
2
d
. (31)
The value of D
o 0
is selected to provide matching between mea-
sured and calculated values for tuned resonator. The most impor-
tant effect of the modication for standard boost is reduction of
maximum detuning factor that the receiver can withstand while
maintaining the required power at the output. It is easy to prove
that
d
,
max
can be calculated as

d,max
=

2
(32)
which is in good correspondence with the experimental results
(
0
= 0.8) shown in Fig. 14.
Figs. 15 and 16 show normalized voltage, power, and
resistance for both boost topologies. Because of symmetry,
the results are given only for overcompensated resonant tank
(
d
>0). Fromthe presented gures, we can drawthe following
conclusions.
1) Standard boost is able to handle small resonant tank de-
tuning by increasing the reected resistance
R
.
2) Tuning ability of the tristate boost almost doubles the
degree of detuning allowable while delivering the required
power. Redesign of the controller H
c
(s) or the use of a
xed switching frequency hysteretic controller may offer a
wider range of tolerable detuning in line with the analytical
results.
Fig. 17. Demonstration of the shielding effect on receiver operation (stan-
dard boost applied): upper trace D
b
(25%/div), lower traces output voltage V
o
(50 V/div); time scale (1 s/div).
Fig. 18. Demonstration of the shielding effect on receiver operation (tristate
boost applied): top trace D
b
(25%/div), trace in the middle D
f , sgn
(25%/div),
lower traces output voltage V
o
(50 V/div); time scale (1 s/div).
3) Tristate boost keeps resonant circuit tuned and reected
resistance R
ac
at constant value (see Fig. 16), which indi-
rectly provides constant impedance reected into primary
track, independent of receiver tuning conditions. This op-
erating mode will provide a known, precalculated load to
the source inverter.
4) Highly detuned operating conditions are accompanied
with reduced efciency of the tristate boost. This is the
result of a longer freewheeling interval that causes larger
inductor current [17], [18]. Further reduction in efciency
results in
P
,
V
,
R
deviation from unity in Fig. 16
which inates the power transfer calculation for large val-
ues of detuning. This error can be eliminated by using
actual efciency values for each specic detuning circum-
stance.
C. Response to Detuning Due to Shielding
A metal object in near proximity of a receiver can cause a
signicant shielding effect reducing secondary inductance and
PANTIC AND LUKIC: FRAMEWORK AND TOPOLOGY FOR ACTIVE TUNING OF PARALLEL COMPENSATED RECEIVERS 4511
increasing resonant circuit losses. If the shielding is severe, res-
onant tank detuning can be substantial and enough to reduce the
power available to the load. This phenomenon is demonstrated
in Fig. 17 where a copper plate (46 cm 30.48 cm 3 mm)
was brought close to a standard boost-controlled receiver and
then moved far away. The resonant circuit detuning was severe
enough to reduce the output voltage V
o
even when the active
switch conduction interval is zero (D
b
= 0). Overvoltage that
follows the copper plate removal was caused by saturation of
the controller. On the other hand, the tristate boost generated
an additional capacitance (D
f
,
sgn
< 0) to maintain the desired
resonant frequency as shown in Fig. 18. Barring a negligible
overvoltage after the plate removal, constant value of V
o
was
maintained.
VI. CONCLUSION
This paper presents a framework for quantifying the effect
of detuning on parallel-compensated receivers in WPT applica-
tions. We show that the power delivery to the load is a strong
function of the newly dened detuning factor
d
as the product
of the normalized value of capacitor detuning and the receiver
quality factor. Based on the analytical study, two methods for
maintaining constant power delivery are identied: injecting an
equal but opposite tuning reactance into the resonant tank or in-
creasing the reected resistance essentially raising the receiver
quality factor. It is shown that increasing the reected resis-
tance has a limited benet to maintaining constant power output
since a larger resistance increases the receiver quality factor and
therefore the value of the detuning factor
d
.
A receiver driver topology based on the tristate boost is pro-
posed that effectively controls both the reactance injected into
the resonant tank and the reected resistance. The new receiver
topology achieves bidirectional tuning control by only using an
additional switch and a diode, and without any additional pas-
sive elements. We have shown through simulations and experi-
ments that this system provides fast and simple tuning capabil-
ity on the receiver side, allowing practicable high-quality-factor
receiver designs. The tristate boost tuning capability is most
helpful when the sourcereceiver coupling is weak leading to
maximum-power-transfer operating mode. Since the boost con-
verter is a subset of the tristate-boost, the freewheeling capability
can be disabled in overcoupled conditions.
Based on the presented work, it is conceivable that a fully
tunable receiver can be designed to operate in a wide frequency
range. This can be achieved by combining the tristate boost
with a bank of discrete tuning capacitors [10]. Alternatively,
for maximum power transfer applications, the boost switch of
the tristate boost converter can be eliminated leaving only the
tuning capability for the system. Such a design would be highly
desirable in energy scavenging applications.
APPENDIX: DERIVATION OF R
ac
AND C
ac
FOR THE TRISTATE BOOST
To simplify the derivation, we make the following
assumptions:
Fig. 19. Illustration of signals at the ac side of a rectier.
Fig. 20. Illustration of signals at the dc side of a rectier.
1) only rst harmonic of V
ac
and I
ac
will be taken into
account;
2) harmonics of rectied voltage V
dc
and inductor current I
L
will be neglected;
3) system will be considered lossless.
With the aforementioned simplications, Figs. 19 and 20 ac-
curately represent the voltage and current at dc and ac sides of
a rectier. The average value of the rectied voltage, V
dc,avg
,
and the rst harmonic of the bridge input current, I
ac,1
, are also
drawn in Figs. 19 and 20, respectively.
As the rst step in derivation, a formula which relates resonant
voltage V
ac
and output voltage V
o
has to be derived. Accepting
zero voltage phase as a reference for the whole system, V
ac
(t)
can be written as
v
ac
() =

2V
ac,rms
sin (33)
where = 2f
s
t.
The average value of the rectied voltage will be
V
dc,avg
=
1

_

D
f

2V
ac,rms
sin d
=

2V
ac,rms

(1 + cos D
f
) . (34)
4512 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012
From the tristate boost side, the average value of the input
voltage can be written [17], [18] as
V
dc,avg
=
D
o
1 D
f
V
o
. (35)
Combining (34) and (35), the required relation can be ob-
tained
V
ac,rms
=
D
o

2 (1 + cos D
f
) (1 D
f
)
V
o
. (36)
Finally, the resonant voltage V
ac
(t) can be expressed in
Laplace domain as a phasor
V
ac
= V
ac,rms
e
j0
=
D
o

2 (1 + cos D
f
) (1 D
f
)
V
o
e
j0
.
(37)
The next step is to establish a similar relation between rst
harmonic of bridge input current I
ac,1
and load current I
o
. From
[17] and [18], we know that
I
L
=
I
dc,avg
1 D
f
=
I
o
D
o
. (38)
On the other hand, developing the signal I
ac
(t) into Fourier
series, the rst harmonic in the following form will be obtained:
I
ac
() =
4

I
L
cos
_
D
f

2
_
sin
_

D
f
2

_
. (39)
Combining (38) and (39) gives
I
ac
() =
4

I
o
D
o
cos
_
D
f

2
_
sin
_

D
f
2

_
. (40)
It can be also expressed in a phasor form:
I
ac
=
2

I
o
D
o
cos
_
D
f

2
_
e
(D
f
/2)
. (41)
Combining (37) and (41) gives the input admittance
Y
ac
=
I
ac
V
ac
=
4

2
cos (D
f
/2) (1 + cos D
f
) (1 D
f
)
D
2
o
R
L
e
(D
f
/2)
= j
s
C
ac
+
1
R
ac
. (42)
Applying Eulers formula
e
j
= cos + j sin (43)
and a simple trigonometric identity
1 + cos D
f
= 2 cos
2
_
D
f

2
_
(44)
nal expressions for R
ac
and C
ac
will be
C
ac
=
8

2
(1 D
f
) cos
3
(D
f
/2) sin ((D
f
/2))
D
2
o
R
L

s
(45)
R
ac
=

2
8
D
2
o
R
L
(1 D
f
) cos
4
(D
f
/2)
. (46)
For the purpose of completeness, the expressions for
R
and

C ac
for tristate boost will be derived

R
=
R
ac
R
ac0
=
D
2
o
D
2
o0
1
(1 D
f
) cos
4
(D
f
/2)
(47)

Cac
=
C
ac
C
s0
=
D
2
o0
D
2
o
(1D
f
) cos
3
(D
f
/2) sin ((D
f
/2))
C
s0
R
ac0

0
=
D
2
o0
Q
s0
D
2
o
(1 D
f
) cos
3
_
D
f

2
_
sin
_
D
f
2

_
. (48)
REFERENCES
[1] N. A. Keeling, G. A. Covic, and J. T. Boys, A unity-power-factor IPT
pickup for high-power applications, IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 57,
no. 2, pp. 744751, Feb. 2010.
[2] S. Ping, A. P. Hu, S. Malpas, and D. Budgett, Switching frequency
analysis of dynamically detuned ICPT power pick-ups, in Proc. Int.
Conf. Power Syst. Technol., 2006, pp. 18.
[3] J. U. W. Hsu, A. P. Hu, and A. Swain, A wireless power pickup based
on directional tuning control of magnetic amplier, IEEE Trans. Ind.
Electron., vol. 56, no. 7, pp. 27712781, Jul. 2009.
[4] H. H. Wu, G. A. Covic, J. T. Boys, and D. J. Robertson, A series-tuned
inductive-power-transfer pickup with a controllable AC-voltage output,
IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 26, no. 1, pp. 98109, Jan. 2011.
[5] H. Matsumoto, Y. Neba, K. Ishizaka, and R. Itoh, Model for a three-phase
contactless power transfer system, IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 26,
no. 6, pp. 26762687, Sep. 2011.
[6] M. Budhia, G. A. Covic, and J. T. Boys, Design and optimization of
circular magnetic structures for lumped inductive power transfer systems,
IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 26, no. 11, pp. 30963108, Nov. 2011.
[7] J. Huh, S. Lee, W. Lee, G. Cho, and C. Rim, Narrow-width inductive
power transfer system for online electrical vehicles, IEEE Trans. Power
Electron., vol. 26, no. 12, pp. 36663679, Dec. 2011.
[8] J. T. Boys, G. A. Covic, and A. W. Green, Stability and control of
inductively coupled power transfer systems, IEE Proc.Electr. Power
Appl., vol. 147, pp. 3743, 2000.
[9] H. Chang-Yu, J. T. Boys, G. A. Covic, and R. Saining, LCL pick-up
circulating current controller for inductive power transfer systems, in
Proc. IEEE Energy Convers. Congr. Expo., 2010, pp. 640646.
[10] A. P. Hu and S. Hussmann, Improved power ow control for contactless
moving sensor applications, IEEE Power Electron. Lett., vol. 2, no. 4,
pp. 135138, Dec. 2004.
[11] Z. Pantic, S. Bai, and S. M. Lukic, ZCS LCC compensated resonant
inverter for inductive power transfer application, IEEE Trans. Ind. Elec-
tron., vol. 58, no. 8, pp. 35003510, Aug. 2010.
[12] B. L. Cannon, J. F. Hoburg, D. D. Stancil, and S. C. Goldstein, Magnetic
resonant coupling as a potential means for wireless power transfer to
multiple small receivers, IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 24, no. 7,
pp. 18191825, Jul. 2009.
[13] G. A. Covic, J. T. Boys, A. M. W. Tam, and J. C. H. Peng, Self tuning
pick-ups for inductive power transfer, in Proc. Power Electron. Spec.
Conf., 2008, pp. 34893494.
[14] W. Chwei-Sen, G. A. Covic, and O. H. Stielau, Power transfer capability
and bifurcation phenomena of loosely coupled inductive power transfer
systems, IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 51, no. 1, pp. 148157, Feb.
2004.
[15] Z. Pantic and S. M. Lukic, A new tri-state-boost-based pickup topology
for inductive power transfer applications, in Proc. IEEE Energy Convers.
Congr. Expo., Phoenix, AZ, Sep. 2011, pp. 34953502.
[16] B. Lenaerts and R. Puers, Omnidirectional Inductive Powering for Biomed-
ical Implants. New York: Springer-Verlag, 2008.
[17] K. Viswanathan, R. Oruganti, and D. Srinivasan, Dual-mode control of
tri-state boost converter for improved performance, IEEE Trans. Power
Electron., vol. 20, no. 4, pp. 790797, Jul. 2005.
[18] K. Viswanathan, R. Oruganti, and D. Srinivasan, A novel tri-state boost
converter with fast dynamics, IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 17,
no. 5, pp. 677683, Sep. 2002.
[19] J. T. Boys, C. I. Chen, and G. A. Covic, Controlling inrush currents in
inductively coupled power systems, in Proc. Power Eng. Conf., 2005,
pp. 10461051.
PANTIC AND LUKIC: FRAMEWORK AND TOPOLOGY FOR ACTIVE TUNING OF PARALLEL COMPENSATED RECEIVERS 4513
[20] J. T. Boys, G. A. Covic, and X. Yongxiang, DC analysis technique for
inductive power transfer pick-ups, IEEE Power Electron. Lett., vol. 1,
no. 2, pp. 5153, Jun. 2003.
[21] M. Veerachary, Signal owgraph modelling of multi-state boost DCDC
converters, IEEProc.Electr. Power Appl., vol. 151, no. 5, pp. 583589,
Sep. 2004.
[22] K. Smedley and S. Cuk, Switching ow-graph nonlinear modeling tech-
nique, IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 9, no. 4, pp. 405413, Jul.
1994.
Zeljko Pantic (S10) received the B.S. and M.S.
degrees in electrical engineering from the School
of Electrical Engineering, Belgrade University,
Belgrade, Serbia, in 1998 and 2007, respectively. He
is currently working toward the Ph.D. degree at the
Future Renewable Electric Energy Delivery and Man-
agement (FREEDM) Systems Center, North Carolina
State University, Raleigh.
In the period between 1999 and 2009, he was a
Teaching Assistant at the Department of Power Con-
verters and Drives. He is currently a Research As-
sistant at FREEDM. His primary research interests include inductive power
transfer, EV/HEV, and motor drives.
Srdjan M. Lukic (S02M07) received the M.S.
and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the
Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago.
From 2002 to 2004, he was with Firey Energy
Inc., where he was responsible for optimizing certain
aspects of carbon/graphite foam-based lead acid bat-
teries for novel automotive applications. He is cur-
rently an Assistant Professor in the Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering, North Carolina
State University, Raleigh. He serves as the distributed
energy storage devices subthrust leader at the Future
Renewable Electric Energy Delivery and Management (FREEDM) Systems En-
gineering Research Center. His research interests include design and control of
power electronic converters and electromagnetic energy conversion with appli-
cation to WPT, energy storage, systems and electric automotive systems.
Dr. Lukic served as a Guest Editor of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUS-
TRIAL ELECTRONICS and serves as an Associate Editor of the IEEE TRANSAC-
TIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS.