Resonant voltage-multiplication, current-regulating and ignition circuit for a fluorescent lamp

A boosting circuit for increasing an amount of energy delivered from an AC source to a fluorescent lamp during continuous operation after ignition of the lamp, the AC source operating at a predetermined AC frequency, the florescent lamp having a pair of cathodes and a medium between the cathodes which is ionizable into a conductive plasma upon ignition of the lamp, said boosting circuit comprising:

• an inductor;
• a capacitor connected in series with the inductor to form an energy storage and delivering resonant circuit, the resonant circuit adapted to be connected in series between one of the cathodes and the AC source to maintain a continuous series connection with the AC source for conducting energy from the AC source to the resonant circuit and to drive the resonant circuit at the predetermined AC frequency of the source, the resonant circuit delivering energy stored in the resonant circuit in addition to energy supplied from the AC source as applied half-cycles of current and voltage applied to the cathodes to ionize the medium into the plasma during each applied half cycle of voltage and current, the continuous series connection of the AC source to the resonant circuit driving the applied half-cycles of current and voltage at the same frequency as the predetermined frequency of the AC source;
• and
• a control module including a conductive switch adapted to be connected in series with and between the cathodes, the control module triggering the switch into conduction during a predetermined conductive time interval of each applied current half-cycle to store additional energy in the resonant circuit for delivery during a subsequent applied current half-cycle, the additional energy adding to the energy otherwise supplied by the source to the resonant circuit to increase the voltage of each applied voltage half-cycle applied to the plasma, the conductive time interval being less than the time interval of each applied current half-cycle.