A new asymmetric dual source multilevel inverter topology with reduced power switches

Multilevel inverters can synthesize a high-voltage staircase waveform with low- and medium-voltage components. A new multilevel inverter topology called Asymmetric Dual Source Multilevel Inverter (ADS-MLI) is proposed. When compared to the topologies found in the literature, it can produce multiple levels in the output voltage with fewer power switches. Most of the topologies found in the literature require cascading features to achieve asymmetric operation; but the ADS-MLI can operate without the need for cascading. A simulation prototype capable of synthesizing 13 levels is developed in MATLAB Simulink environment. Its performance is evaluated in the aspects of; number of switching components, efficiency, THD, switching voltage stress and common mode voltage. The simulated efficiency and power quality of the DS-MLI is validated using a 1 kW prototype fabricated using FGA25N120-ANTD controlled by FPGA-SPARTAN 6 processor. Further, the DS-MLI is field tested with a 1 kW solar PV unit and the results are presented.     

3D Echocardiogram Reconstruction Employing a Flip Directional Texture Pyramid

Three dimensional (3D) echocardiogram enables cardiologists to visualize suspicious cardiac structures in detail. In recent years, this three-dimensional echocardiogram carries important clinical value in virtual surgical simulation. However, this 3D echocardiogram involves a trade-off difficulty between accuracy and efficient computation in clinical diagnosis. This paper presents a novel Flip Directional 3D Volume Reconstruction (FD-3DVR) method for the reconstruction of echocardiogram images. The proposed method consists of two main steps: multiplanar volumetric imaging and 3D volume reconstruction. In the creation of multiplanar volumetric imaging, two-dimensional (2D) image pixels are mapped into voxels of the volumetric grid. As the obtained slices are discontinuous, there are some missing voxels in the volume data. To restore the structural and textural information of 3D ultrasound volume, the proposed method creates a volume pyramid in parallel with the flip directional texture pyramid. Initially, the nearest neighbors of missing voxels in the multiplanar volumetric imaging are identified by 3D ANN (Approximate Nearest Neighbor) patch matching method. Furthermore, a flip directional texture pyramid is proposed and aggregated with distance in patch matching to find out the most similar neighbors. In the reconstruction step, structural and textural information obtained from different flip angle directions can reconstruct 3D volume well with the desired accuracy. Compared with existing 3D reconstruction methods, the proposed Flip Directional 3D Volume Reconstruction (FD-3DVR) method provides superior performance for the mean peak signal-to-noise ratio (40.538 for the proposed method I and 39.626 for the proposed method II). Experimental results performed on the cardiac datasets demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method for the reconstruction of echocardiogram images.     

A new generalized switched diode multilevel inverter topology with reduced switch count and voltage on switches

This article presents a new multilevel inverter topology with reduced power switches. The proposed topology composes of several series connection of basic unit for obtaining a required output voltage level. The proposed topology can operate in symmetric condition. The proposed topology is connected in a cascaded structure to produce a higher number of output voltage levels. The proposed cascaded structure is optimized with the minimum number of components for the maximum number of levels. To prove the superiority of the proposed multilevel inverter topology, different technical parameter comparisons are carried out with recently developed multilevel inverter topologies from the literature. The calculation of total standing voltage is examined for the proposed topology. The operation of the proposed topology is tested and verified for nine-level output voltage. The simulated results are carried out, and it is strengthened by the real-time prototype results.     

A New Switched DC-Link Capacitor-based Multi-level Converter (SDC2MLC)

At present, one of the most common techniques for high power conversion in medium-voltage applications is the use of cascaded multi-level converters. In this article, a new Switched DC-Link Capacitor Multi-level converter (SDC²MLC) with considerably few numbers of power electronics switches (IGBTs) is proposed, where keeping the total harmonic distortion of the output voltage waveforms as low as possible is desired. The proposed topology is configured using two separate basic units. Each unit consists of four switches with a series-parallel combination of isolated DC sources. The performance of the presented topology for both configurations is described. The required number of switches, power diodes, gate driver circuits, and voltage stresses across the switches are compared with those of other recently published techniques. Furthermore, the operation and performance of the proposed SDC²MLC are illustrated with the aid of experimental results of a single-phase 11-level converter to clarify the viability of the proposed topology.     

Improvement of Slurry Erosion Wear Resistance of 16Cr-5Ni Martensite Stainless Steel by LSA and LTH

Laser surface alloying (LSA), with Wallex-50 and Tribaloy-700 powders, and laser transformation hardening (LTH) reduced the silt erosion rate in 16Cr-5Ni steel. Slurry erosion wear tests were conducted on 16Cr-5Ni steel, LSA-modified steel, and LT-hardened steel at different angles of impingement and velocities at a constant size of silica particles. The LSA-modified steel and LT-hardened steel showed improved wear resistance by about 1.5-3 times as compared to substrate 16Cr-5Ni steel for all angles of impingement. This improvement in hardness and erosion resistance was due to the incorporation of carbides and hard complex phases after LSA and LTH.     

Improved “K” type seven-level switched capacitor inverter topology with Self-voltage balancing

This paper proposes an improved “K” type seven-level switched capacitor inverter topology. The proposed topology consists of eight active switches, one floating capacitor, and two dc-link capacitors. The floating capacitors are charged and discharged in each half-cycle to maintain the capacitor voltage with the same value of the input voltage. The floating capacitor voltage is self-balanced, and the output voltage is 1.5 times higher than the input voltage. To prove the superiority of the proposed topology, it is compared with the existing seven-level inverters in terms of maximum voltage stress on the switch and required the number of power components. The simulation and experimental validation are carried out for 1.6 kW, 50 Hz using a laboratory-based setup with a switching frequency of 5 kHz. The results are discussed highlighting the performance of the proposed topology for the dynamic load variations at different modulation indices. Both simulation results and experimental results have good agreement in terms of voltage balancing of flying capacitor.