A Low-Voltage-Driven Cascaded Half-Bridge Modular Pulse Generator for Tumor Treating Fields Cancer Therapy

Cancer treatment is heading into a new era by utilising Tumour Treating Fields (TTFields) as a solo treatment or in combination with systemic therapies. The treatment intensively relies on a Pulse Generator (PG), and the more versatile the PG, the more flexibility it offers in exposing the cells to various sets of pulse bursts. The literature shows that mixed synergetic pulses show a better effect in increasing the ablation area and killing cancer cells during in vitro and in vivo trials. This paper presents a fully modular and versatile pulse generator driven by a low-voltage DC source designed for TTFields-based cancer therapy, with the capability to boost the voltage by twice the number of submodules. The PG employs a cascaded half-bridge (CHB) submodule, with submodule capacitors charged sequentially while switches are softly reconfigured for a series connection to generate the required voltage pulses. SiC wide-bandgap devices aided by a soft-switching strategy are employed to reduce switching losses, improve pulse rise time, and enable higher repetition rates. A novel utilisation of the on-die configurable logic block (CLB) for the C2000 digital signal controller facilitates control of the high number of gate signals and mitigates the complexity of using a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA). The proposed concept is validated through MATLAB/Simulink modelling and experimental testing on a resistive load. The results have shown the system’s reliable pulse shaping, voltage scalability, and precise control, highlighting its potential in preclinical cancer studies.