Patent ID: 8446745

Claim:
A power conversion circuit, comprising: an input stage which repeatedly, at various times, drives current into the parallel combination of an inductor and a capacitor, and immediately thereafter temporarily disconnects said parallel combination from external connections, to thereby transfer some energy from said inductor to said capacitor; wherein said action of driving current is performed in opposite senses and various times, and wherein said disconnecting operation is performed substantially identically for both directions of said step of driving current; a link switch, connected across said inductor-capacitor combination in a crowbar configuration which includes a resistance element which is connected to dissipate energy stored in said inductor-capacitor combination when said link switch is on; and an output stage which extracts energy from said parallel combination, to thereby perform power conversion; wherein, when said link switch is on, said stages are connected to totally disconnect said inductor-capacitor combination from a power input and a power output of said power conversion circuit.