RF POWER AMPLIFICATION AND DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS, PLASMA IGNITION SYSTEMS, AND METHODS OF OPERATING THEM

摘要

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To significantly increase fuel efficiency and reduce the quantities of potentially harmful gases that are exhausted into the environment.SOLUTION: An embodiment of a plasma ignition system for an internal combustion engine having up to N cylinders includes: a power splitter; N phase shifters; N amplifiers; a power combiner network; and up to N radiation devices. The power splitter divides an input RF signal into N divided RF signals. Each phase shifter applies one of multiple pre-determined phase shifts to one of the N divided RF signals to produce N phase shifted RF signals. The N amplifiers amplify the N phase shifted RF signals to produce N amplified, phase shifted RF signals. The power combiner network combines the N amplified, phase shifted RF signals to produce N output RF signals. Each of the radiation devices receives one of the N output RF signals, and produces a plasma discharge when a power level of the output RF signal is sufficiently high.