Power electronics is rich in nonlinear dynamics. Its operation is characterized by cyclic switching of circuit topologies, which gives rise to a variety of nonlinear behavior. This chapter provides an overview of the chaotic dynamics and bifurcation scenarios observed in power electronics circuits, emphasizing the salient features of the circuit operation and the modelling strategies. This chapter covers the modelling approaches, analysis methods, and a classification of the common types of bifurcations observed in power electronics.

16.1 Introduction

Power electronics is a discipline spawned by real-life applications in industrial, commercial, residential and aerospace environments. Much of the development of the field of power electronics evolves around some immediate needs for solving specific power conversion problems. In the past three decades, power electronics has gone through intense development in many aspects of technology ^[1], including power devices, control methods, circuit design, computer-aided analysis, passive components, packaging techniques, etc. Moreover, the principal focus in power electronics, as reflected from topics discussed in some key power electronics conferences ^[2], ^[3], is to fulfill the functional requirements of the application for which the concerned...