Patent ID: 7243006

Claim:
A control system for controlling the operation of a power circuit, said power circuit having N binary switches for one of providing power to and receiving power from a load circuit, said N binary switches having various configurations being represented by a finite state machine having up to 2 N switch states, a present configuration of said N binary switches being associated with a present switch state and having a plurality of next switch states according to state transition constraints of the finite state machine, said control system comprising: a) an acquisition module for acquiring a set of operational signals related to the load circuit associated with the present switch state; b) an embedded simulator coupled to the acquisition module for estimating a set of estimated operational characteristics of the load circuit based on the set of operational signals and the present switch state; c) a next state contemplator coupled to said embedded simulator for estimating a set of estimated operational characteristics of the load circuit for each of the plurality of next switch states, for comparing and selecting the next switch state having estimated operational characteristics that best meet a first set of criteria, and for actuating the power circuit to change the switch configuration of the N binary switches therein to the switch configuration associated with said selected next switch state of the plurality of next switch states.