[Alessandro ZAFARANA] US AZ Phoenix Quasi-Constant On-Time Controller. At least one example embodiment is a method of operating a power converter, comprising: charging an inductor of a switching power converter, each charging has an on-time; and then discharging the inductor while providing current to the load; and repeating the charging and the discharging at a switching frequency. During the repeating, the example method may comprise: adjusting the switching frequency proportional to a voltage difference between an output voltage and a setpoint voltage; generating an on-time reference proportional to a frequency difference between the switching frequency and a setpoint frequency, the on-time of each charging of the inductor is based on the on-time reference; and modifying the on-time proportional to the voltage difference.

[Salvatore Leone, Alessandro Zafarana] US AZ Phoenix Systems for power conversion, and controllers and methods for operating a multiage power converter. The method includes determining a target body brake time period for setting a load current of the multistage power converter below a predetermined threshold. The method also includes activating a body brake condition for the multistage power converter. The method further includes turning off each stage in the multistage power converter when the body brake condition is active. The method also includes deactivating the body brake condition after the target body brake time period following an activation of the body brake condition.

[Osvaldo Zambetti, Alessandro Zafarana] IT Agrate Brianza (MI) A method is provided for controlling a converter of the multiphase interleaving type. According to the method, there is detected when a change of the load applied to an output terminal of the converter occurs. All the phases of the converter are simultaneously turned on, and a driving interleaving phase shift is recovered to restart a normal operation of the converter. A controller for carrying out such a method is also provided.

[Alessandro Zafarana, Claudia Castelli] IT Agrate Brianza A voltage/current controller device, particularly for interleaving switching regulators, comprises: a DC/DC converter having a plurality of modules, with each module including a drive transistor pair connected in series between first and second supply voltage references, a current sensor connected to one transistor in the pair, and a current read circuit connected to the sensor. Advantageously, the read circuit comprises a transconductance amplifier connected across the current sensor to sense a voltage signal related to a load current being applied to each module, the transconductance amplifier reading the voltage signal with the transistor in the conducting state.

[CAPPELLETTI ANDREA, ZAFARANA ALESSANDRO, ZAMBETTI OSVALDO ENRICO]

[ZAFARANA ALESSANDRO, COCETTA FRANCO, MERLO MAURO] PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a voltage regulator for a generator and a nonlinear filter method, by which the switching frequency of an output control signal can be regulated and the accuracy of the steady state of the generator can be maintained. SOLUTION: In a voltage regulator, a linear filter 2, a comparator 3 and an expansion filter 4 are connected to each other with a cascade connection between the input terminal I1 and output terminal O1 of the regulator 1. The input terminal I1 receives an error signal ERR which is converted into a square wave error signal ERRq by the comparator 3 and, furthermore, the output terminal O1 supplies a square wave output control signal Sout which has an expanded duty cycle in relation to the square wave error signal EERq by the time delay introduced from the expansion filter 4. A nonlinear filter section 5 for the error signal is connected between the input terminal of the regulator and the linear filter. By comparing with the 1st and 2nd values X1 and X2 of the error signal, a gain is regulated.

[Alessandro Zafarana, Osvaldo Zambetti] IT Agrate Brianza (MI) A method is provided for controlling a converter of the multiphase interleaving type. According to the method, there is detected when a change of the load applied to an output terminal of the converter occurs. All the phases of the converter are simultaneously turned off, and a driving interleaving phase shift is recovered so as to restart a normal operation of the converter. A controller for carrying out such a method is also provided.

[Alessandro Zafarana, Claudia Castelli] IT Agrate Brianza A voltage/current controller device, particularly for interleaving switching regulators, comprises: a DC/DC converter having a plurality of modules, with each module including a drive transistor pair connected in series between first and second supply voltage references, a current sensor connected to one transistor in the pair, and a current read circuit connected to the sensor. Advantageously, the read circuit comprises a transconductance amplifier connected across the current sensor to sense a voltage signal related to a load current being applied to each module, the transconductance amplifier reading the voltage signal with the transistor in the conducting state.

[Alessandro Zafarana, Osvaldo Enrico Zambetti, Andrea Cappelletti] IT Agrate Brianza An embodiment of method is described for controlling a voltage regulator of the type comprising at least one modulator of the PWM type, the method comprising: 1) generation of a control voltage signal for said PWM modulator; 2) frequency modulation of said control voltage signal obtaining a modulated control voltage signal having an harmonic at a switching frequency of said voltage regulator of reduced entity with respect to said control voltage signal; and 3) application of said modulated control voltage signal to said PWM modulator for generating a driving signal for said voltage regulator.

[Zambetti, Osvaldo, Zafarana, Alessandro] Via C. Olivetti, 2, 20041 Agrate Brianza (Milano), IT A method is described fur- controlling a converter of the multiphase interleaving type comprising the steps of:＜br /＞ - detecting when a change of the load applied to an output terminal of the converter occurs by detecting the derivative of a voltage signal of the output terminal;＜br /＞ - simultaneously driving all the phases of said converter by zeroing a driving interleaving phase shift on the basis of said detected load transient; and＜br /＞ - recovering said driving interleaving phase shift for restarting a normal operation of said converter.A controller is also described for carrying out this method. ＜img id="iaf01" file="imgaf001.tif" wi="165" he="99" img-content="drawing" img-format="tif" /＞