Rapid Assessment of the Thermal Safety of Low-Frequency Inductive Power Transfer Systems for Implantable Devices

Numerical assessment of the thermal safety of inductive power transfer systems imposes significant computational costs. This report proposes a method with significantly reduced computational costs. The first step requires calculation of heating for two arbitrary sets of values for the properties of the inductive power transfer system. A linear approximation for the power dissipation-temperature relationship is obtained using these two points. The thermally optimal characteristics of the system can then be obtained by substituting the values of the required temperature into the resulting linear equation. This method is shown to provide sufficient accuracy for it to be used in design procedures for low-frequency inductive power transfer systems for implantable devices.