21-09-2008, 09:41 AM
An Inverter is simply an electronic device that converts low voltage DC battery power 230 volts AC (Alternating Current) electrical power. They are used in applications ranging from microwaves laptops to satellite systems X-Ray machines etc.
Most industrial applications require high frequency high voltage power supply. These increased power requirements have lead to significant development in inverted technology.
Significant improvements have been made to the traditional pulse width modulations (PWM) Inverters to make power distribution system more efficient and more suitable to reactive power (var) compensation and harmonic filtering.
This includes using multilevel inverters, zero current switching and other power switching devises. Space application involves high power (hundreds of kilowatts to megawatts) systems. Large power conditioning mass reductions are required to enable this megawatt power system.
Therefore inverter design for space applications represents the state - of - the- art in power conditioning technology. Different features such as design parameters, output a characteristics, switching components etc of these inverters used in space application are discussed in the II part of the paper. .
