Study on Magnetic Materials Used in Power Transformer and Inductor

Power electronics system is generally comprised of electrical and magnetic circuits. Nowadays, there were a lot of research works on circuit topologies ranging from single switch converter to soft-switching topologies, but the most difficult problems encountered by many design engineers were magnetic issues, such as construction of transformer or inductor, application of air-gap, under- or over-estimated power rating of the magnetic components, selection of magnetic core and so on. The overall performance of any power converters depend on not only the circuit design, but also the application of magnetic components, this paper will address some common problems related to the applications of magnetic components, and some critical factors involved into development of such components for power converters. A brief summary of some major magnetic materials, such as soft ferrites, powder iron and alloys will be mentioned in this paper too.