Rigorous Network and Full-Wave Electromagnetic Modeling of Wireless Power Transfer Links

Abstract

The proposed approach makes use of full-wave electromagnetic modeling of wireless power transfer links in order to derive the network characterization, e.g., in terms of scattering or impedance matrix. Once the latter is obtained, we show that network theory provides the appropriate matching impedances for achieving either maximum efficiency, maximum power on the load, or conjugate matching. The proposed approach also permits to derive closed-form matching networks and expressions for power and efficiency. An example of full-wave numerical electromagnetic modeling of a wireless power transfer link is presented. The selected example, which is similar to the experiment published by Kurs et al., shows the importance of selecting the appropriate source/load impedance for obtaining significative results.