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Vol. 7, No. 2 www.pels.org
June 2020
For your engineering success
82 Features
22 Emerging Opportunities in Distributed Power Electronics

and Battery Integration
Setting the stage for an energy storage revolution
Issa Batarseh and Khalil Alluhaybi
33 FEPPCON X: Part 2
Four summaries from the technical sessions
Departments Ashok Bindra
& Columns The Future of Control and Communication
Power electronics-enabled power grids
4 From the Editor Rolando Burgos and Jian Sun
Can Power Electronics Enable an Energy-
Storage-Based Society? Power Electronics Design Methods and Automation
Ashok Bindra in the Digital Era
8 President’s Message Evolution of design automation tools
Guiding PELS Through the COVID-19 Antonio J. Marques Cardoso
Pandemic
Frede Blaabjerg The Future of Power Electronics Circuits
New technologies and managed complexity will drive the future
12 Happenings
Robert Pilawa-Podgurski
U.S. Department of Energy Funds Syndem
to Advance Solar Inverter Technology Energy Access
Ashok Bindra A new power electronics story
18 Passive Components Jelena Popovic
Metal Composite Power Inductors for
Automotive Applications 47 Space Mapping for Codesigned Magnetics
Optimization techniques for high-fidelity multidomain design specifications
Ashok Bindra
Kristen Booth and John Bandler
72 Patent Reviews
Patent Applicant’s Duty of Disclosure
Art MacCord 53 On Power Scalability of Modular Multilevel Converters
Increasing current ratings through branch paralleling
76 Company Profile Stefan Milovanovic and Drazen Dujic
Indium Corporation: Igniting an Electronics
Materials Renaissance in Upstate New York
Andy Mackie 64 APEC Organizers, Vendors Take Virtual Route to Reveal
Latest Trends in Power Technologies and Products
80 Expert View
A cancelled conference taps alternate methods to disseminate
Capacitive-Based Power
cutting-edge information
Architectures Gain Ground
Stephen J. Allen Ashok Bindra
82 Society News
94 Book Review
On the cover
The safe and reliable integration of photovoltaic panels
Power Electronics in Renewable
with battery and power electronics in a single module
Energy Systems and Smart Grid: will usher in new opportunities for smart distributed
Technology and Applications solar systems with storage in both grid- and off-grid
96 In Memoriam connected applications.
98 Event Calendar ILLUSTRATION BY KHALIL ALLUHAYBI, UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL FLORIDA, ORLANDO.
BACKGROUND IMAGE: LICENSED BY INGRAM PUBLISHING
104 White Hot

My First Power Supply Design
Robert V. White
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPEL.2020.2984348
June 2020 z IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE 1

IEEE Power Electronics Magazine
Editor-in-Chief IEEE Power Electronics 2021 Members-at-Large Alireza Khaligh
Ashok Bindra Society Officers Vladimir Blasko Vehicle and Transportation Systems
12 Magnolia Ave. Frede Blaabjerg United Technology Research khaligh@ece.umd.edu
Nesconset, NY 11767 USA President Center, United States
+1 631 471 5895 fbl@iet.aau.dk Antonio Cardoso Advertising Sales
bindra1@verizon.net Liuchen Chang University of Beira Interior, Portugal Walter Chalupa
President Elect National Sales Manager
Udaya K. Madawala
VP Conferences University of Auckland, Kerstin Chalupa
Deputy Editors-in-Chief lchang@unb.ca International Sales Manager
Robert N. Guenther (Industry) New Zealand
Alan Mantooth Telephone: +1 973 835 7015
VP-Product Development Axel Mertens chalupapels@aol.com
Immediate Past President Universität Hannover, Germany
NWL
Nominations Committee Chair
Bordentown, NJ 08505 USA Maryam Saeedifard IEEE Power Electronics
mantooth@uark.edu
+1 609-298-7300 ext. 1245 Georgia Tech, United States Society Staff
RGuenther@nwl.com Braham Ferreira
Senior Past President Shinzo Tamai Mike Kelly
John Shen (Academic) Long-Range Planning Toshiba Mitsubishi-Electric Industrial Executive Director
Grainger Chair Professor Committee Chair Systems Corporation, Japan m.p.kelly@ieee.org
Department of Electrical j.a.ferreira@tudelft.nl Jane Celusak
2022 Members-at-Large Project Manager
and Computer Engineering Mario Pacas
Christina DiMarino j.celusak@ieee.org
Illinois Institute of Technology VP Global Operations Virginia Tech, United States
10 West 35th Street, Suite 1600 pacas@uni-siegen.de Alicia Tomaszewski
Chicago, IL 60616 USA Yan-Fei Liu Marco Liserre
Project Manager Transportation
+1 312 567-3352 Keil University, Germany
VP Technical Operations Electrification Community
zjohnshen@gmail.com yanfei.liu@queensu.ca Sudip K. Mazumder a.tomaszewski@ieee.org
Brad Lehman University of Illinois at Chicago,
United States Becky Boresen
Magazine Advisory Board VP Products Technical Community
lehman@ece.neu.edu Brendan McGrath Program Specialist
John Shen RMIT University, Australia
MAB Cochair Johan Enslin b.boresen@ieee.org
Chairman VP Standards Xiongfei Wang
Illinois Institute of Technology jenslin@clemson.edu Aalborg University, Denmark IEEE Periodicals
Jian Sun Mark Dehong Xu Magazines Department
Robert N. Guenther Treasurer Zhejiang University, China 445 Hoes Lane, Piscataway, NJ
MAB Cochair jsun@ecse.rpi.edu 08854 USA
NWL Jinjun Liu Technical Committee Chairs Jessica Welsh
VP Membership Brian Zahnstecher Managing Editor
William A. Peterson Communications Energy Systems
D&V Electronics jjliu@mail.xjtu.edu.cn Geraldine Krolin-Taylor
David B. Durocher bz@powerrox.com Senior Managing Editor
Mark Dehong Xu Division II Director Jin Wang Janet Dudar
Zhejiang University, China High Performance and Emerging Senior Art Director
2020 Members-at-Large Technologies
Ernie Parker Johan Enslin Gail A. Schnitzer
wang.1248@osu.edu
Crane Aerospace and Electronics Clemson University, United States Associate Art Director
Uday Deshpande Theresa L. Smith
Noriko Kawakami Motor Drives and Actuators
Annette Mutze Production Coordinator
Toshiba Mitsubishi-Electric udayd@ieee.org
Graz University of Technology, Industrial Systems Corp., Japan Mark David
Graz, Austria Rolando Burgos Sr. Manager Advertising and
Brad Lehman Power and Control Core
Stephanie Watts Butler Northeastern University, Business Development
Technologies
Texas Instruments United States rburgos@ieee.org Felicia Spagnoli
Helen Li Advertising Production Manager
Soma Essakiappan Hanh-Phuc Le
Florida State University, Power Conversion Systems Peter M. Tuohy
University of North Carolina- United States Production Director
Charlotte and Components
Marco Rivera hanhphuc@colorado.edu Kevin Lisankie
University of Talca, Chile Sudip Mazumder Editorial Services Director
Pradeep Shenoy Sustainable Energy Systems Dawn M. Melley
Texas Instruments, United States mazumder@uic.edu Staff Director, Publishing Operations
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Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPEL.2020.2984349 SFI-01681
2 IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE z June 2020

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From the Editor
by Ashok Bindra
Can Power Electronics Enable an

Energy-Storage-Based Society?
A
lthough the coronavirus pan- ficiency, and reliability—is paving the four more summaries from FEPPCON
demic has changed the world, way for a new electric-energy-storage X. They are “The Future of Control and
hurting millions of people revolution that is transforming the Communication,” by Prof. Rolando
and the global economy, the struggle grid as we know it. As a result, the in- Burgos and Prof. Jian Sun, “Power
to defeat this monster continues. tegration of renewable sources with Electronics Design Methods and Auto-
The manner in which countries are batteries, power electronics, and pro- mation in the Digital Era,” by Prof. Anto-
working together to eliminate a com- tection will disrupt the current meth- nio J. Marques Cardoso, “The Future
mon enemy shows that there is light ods for generating, distributing, and of Power Electronics Circuits,” by Prof.
at the end of the tunnel. God bless consuming energy in the same man- Robert Pilawa-Podgurski, and “Energy
those brave medical and health-care ner that refrigeration disrupted the Access,” by Prof. Jelena Popovic.
professionals on the front lines, sav- world’s production, distribution, and The next feature, “Space Mapping
ing lives and giving hope to the mil- consumption of food. Additionally, as for Codesigned Magnetics,” by Kristen
lions of families. Like many others, per this article, new storage systems Booth and John Bandler, describes
the IEEE and the IEEE Power Elec- and integration methods promise to techniques such as codesign and
tronics Society (PELS) are also going bring about a significant paradigm space mapping to realize more ad-
through a transformation that will shift in power electronics technology, vanced magnetic design. In essence,
ultimately be good for the profession- widely extending its application reach. it shows that by combining these two
al community. Meanwhile, as we pray The authors suggest that it is now techniques, the engineer can optimal-
and work together for speedy recov- possible to safely and reliably inte- ly design a high-frequency transform-
ery from this calamity, workers like grate photovoltaic panel, battery, and er that meets electrical and mechani-
me feel lucky to be safe, healthy, and power electronics with protection in cal constraints.
productive. Thanks to the Internet, a single module, ushering in a new In the fourth feature article, “On
online tools are enabling us to contin- era with opportunities for practical, Power Scalability of Modular Mul-
ue writing and processing content smart-distributed renewable solutions tilevel Converters,” Stefan Milova-
for IEEE Power Electronics Maga- in both grid and off-grid connect- novic and Prof. Drazen Dujic present
zine. As a result, this issue, where the ed applications. a method for extending the power
focus is on integrated battery stor- In the December 2019 issue of the capacity of modular multilevel con-
age systems, was not in danger of magazine, we published a few session verters (MMCs) by paralleling its sub-
being delayed. summaries of talks presented at the branches (SBRs). The proposed con-
In the first article of this issue, 10th IEEE Future of Electronic Power trol method enables the balancing of
“Emerging Opportunities in Distrib- Processing and Conversion (FEPP- energies among the converter SBRs
uted Power Electronics and Battery CON X). They included sessions on while keeping their currents partially
Integration,” Prof. Issa Batarseh and batteries as energy storage technolo- balanced at all times. Currently, the
Khalil Alluhaybi show that substan- gy, the power electronics system view researchers are finalizing the MMC
tial improvement in battery technol- of energy storage, and new technology platform, which will be used to sup-
ogy and storage—in terms of cost, ef- and solutions needed for high-power port research activities like the ones
applications, along with the keynote presented in their article.
talk on global climate change. In the Finally, the feature article “APEC
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 second part of that series, we bring Organizers, Vendors Take Virtual Route

to Reveal Latest Trends in Power as electromagnetic interference filters. lished in the December 2019 issue of
Technologies and Products” is by yours Likewise, in the “Patent Reviews” col- IEEE Industrial Electronics Maga-
truly, and it brings the latest from the umn, Art MacCord focuses on the pat- zine. Finally, the “Event Calendar” pro-
virtual IEEE Applied Power Elec- ent applicant’s duty of disclosure, and vides a year’s listings of conferences
tronics Conference and Exposition the “White Hot” column by Robert V. and workshops.
(APEC) 2020, made possible through White presents his first commercial While I would like to thank all of
online meetings and video conferenc- power supply design at the General you for your continuous support, I
ing. The plenary presentations and Electric Power Systems Business Unit also pray and hope that you all are
technical sessions were available in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Besides safe and healthy. Hopefully, we will
via the 2020 IEEE APEC app and the providing a preview of the IEEE Ener- overcome this COVID-19 crisis to re-
EventScribe web portal. gy Conversion Congress and Exposi- turn to our new normal way of life
tion (ECCE) 2020 in Detroit, Michi- sooner rather than later. IEEE Power
Columns and News gan, the “Society News” column also Electronics Magazine is committed
The “Happenings” column highlights brings interesting events and activi- to bringing timely articles, columns,
the U.S. Department of Energy Solar ties from PELS Chapters around the and news items of interest and value
Energy Technologies Office funding world, including the prestigious IEEE to practicing power electronics engi-
US$600,000 to Chicago-based smart medals won by PELS current Presi- neers. To serve you better and keep
grid start-up Syndem to advance solar dent Prof. Frede Blaabjerg and Past this magazine a valuable resource for
systems integration technologies. The President Prof. Rik W. De Doncker. working power electronics engineers
“Passive Components” column reveals This issue also includes a “Book worldwide, we look forward to your
a new family of metal composite Review” column, which is an excerpt feedback and suggestions. Take care,
power inductors to address the strin- of a review written by Prof. Marian P. and stay safe.
gent demands of the automotive elec- Kazmierkowski of Warsaw University
tronic control unit applications as well of Technology, Poland, and was pub-
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President’s Message
by Frede Blaabjerg
Guiding PELS Through the

COVID-19 Pandemic
T
he IEEE Power Electronics because our technology is needed all crisis worsened around the world in
Society (PELS) has now exist- over the world for many applications, April, there was no chance that these
ed for more than 30 years, and and many companies are in the busi- conferences could be held in person
I think the current state of the world ness of power electronics now. Un- when web-based virtual conferences
has been our most challenging time. fortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic could do the job. As a result, except for
Within a month and a half, the world made it impossible to hold the in-per- one or two conferences, they are now
has come to a near standstill due to son event this year. all planned to be held after July, which
the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandem- Traditionally, at APEC, PELS has of course means the conference cal-
ic. The virus is tragic because it has organized all its meetings to keep the endar might be crowded from August
taken many lives and hit many fami- Society running, for example, confer- to December. Kudos to the Vice Presi-
lies hard. In the future, many more ence planning; our dent of Conferences
people will be affected as the econo- seven technical com- Liuchen Chang who
my is impacted significantly and the mittees; products The impact of COVID-19 has worked hard to
virus continues to spread. like journals, transac- is expected to last a ensure that there
In this column, I had originally tions, and this maga- very long time, so we are no overlapping
planned to write about the develop- zine; the Adminis- con fer ence s . T he
have encouraged all
ments at the IEEE Applied Power trative Committee l a r ge s t move h a s
conferences to offer
Electronics Conference and Exposition (AdCom); and so on. been the IEEE En-
(APEC) 2020 in New Orleans, Louisi- Although we had to both options for e r g y C o nv e r s io n
ana, on 15–19 March. But one week cancel all in-person presenters—physical Congress and Expo-
before the event, we found out that we meetings, PELS ex- and virtual sition (ECCE)-Asia,
could not hold APEC as a physical event ecutives successfully presentations. which is moved to
because more and more people could managed to hold on- No v e m b e r, a l o n g
not travel, and companies were not al- line meetings with with many others.
lowed to send people to the conference. many participants. A final AdCom The impact of COVID-19 is expected
In addition, countries one by one were meeting was held virtually in late to last a very long time, so we have en-
closing down completely. Therefore, April during which all issues related couraged all conferences to offer both
we decided to make APEC 2020 a vir- to the 2020 and 2021 budgets were options for presenters—physical and
tual event and conduct some of the ac- discussed and many other new activi- virtual presentations—and thereby
tivities online. Such a transformation ties were approved. This shows that it be able to publish the paper together
requires many voluntary resources, and is possible to successfully hold larger with a presentation. Later, all accept-
I would like to thank all who have been virtual meetings without being physi- ed papers will be included in the IEEE
involved in this process—while at the cally together. Xplore digital library. Consequently,
same time starting to plan APEC 2021. COVID-19 has affected PELS a we are offering a wide number of pos-
This year, we were expecting a re- great deal and the IEEE as a whole. sibilities to authors. So please send
cord high attendance at APEC 2020 Along with the changes at APEC, there your papers to those conferences and
were many other PELS conferences to the upcoming conferences in 2021.
be held in the spring and summer of Due to COVID-19, physical meetings
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 2020 that needed reorganizing. As the have been very limited, and universities

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have been closed for longer periods of year, we successfully launched such a look at those papers; they are free
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employees have also started work- with good attendance, which was an ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue
ing from home. So we are seeing a encouraging event. .jsp?punumber=8782709. Also, consider
very fast transition in the workplace, During such times, with no travel, submitting papers to this journal and
as students also adjust to learning we can expect more papers being support its establishment. It will take
remotely, which seems to work fine submitted to journals. However, be- three years for it to be registered in
in many situations. Thus, the way of cause companies and universities/ the Web of Science and receive an im-
working and studying may change institu tions are closed, it can be dif- pact factor.
forever, even after the situation is sta- ficult to support the theory in papers The next upcoming large events
bilized. Strategically, as the Society’s with enough experiments. In that case, sponsored by PELS will be the Euro-
work becomes more and more virtual, papers could be accepted with manda- pean Power Electronics 2020 ECCE
it will become natural to do things tory changes. Editors will typically Europe in Lille, France, in Septem-
without having to travel. Accordingly, give authors extra time to submit the ber and ECCE North America (NA)
PELS Chapters and other member- supporting measurements so that in Detroit, Michigan, in October. We
ship activities could also be estab- the papers offer the same high quality hope we are able to come together
lished as web-based meetings, both and high standards when accepted as physically again at these events. At
in difficult times and normal situa- transactions papers. ECCE NA, among many activities,
tions. Actually, such virtual meetings Our new IEEE Open Journal of we will have a townhall meeting
could become even more frequent. Power Electronics is moving along where PELS members will gather to
Also, PELS will try to organize half- and had already received more than 50 discuss PELS activities. I hope to see
day events with a specific theme on manuscripts for review in April when many of you there! To all—take care
the agenda—a combination of presen- this column was prepared, and eight and stay safe.
tations, Q&A, and discussions. Last papers were accepted. Please take
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Happenings
by Ashok Bindra
U.S. Department of Energy Funds

Syndem to Advance Solar
Inverter Technology
E
arly this year, Chicago, Illinois- machine (VSM) tech- eration onto the grid
based smart grid start-u p Syn- nology to s h a r p l y Using the funds, the in a cost-effective,
dem was awarded US$600,000 increase the use of secure, resilient, and
burgeoning company
by the U.S. Department of Energy solar power. reliable manner. In a
(DoE) Solar Energy Technologies In granting this will further develop press statement, the
Office (SETO) to advance solar sys- award, the DoE rec- its patented virtual DoE indicated that
tems integration technologies. Con- ognized the Syndem synchronous machine Syndem’s converter
sequently, using the funds, the bur- technology as an technology to technology will in -
geoning company will further devel- essential advance sharply increase crease the use of solar
op its patented virtual synchronous that will better en - power in homes and
the use of solar
able grid operators businesses by making
t o add increasing power. it easier for grid op-
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 amounts of solar generators to integrate
Microgrid
Test Site
50-kW/400-kWh Battery
Two 500-kW Load Banks
500-kW Generator
150-kW Solar Array
Opal-RT Simulator
Housed in a
National Wind Institute
Building
Microgrid Control Center
FIG 1 The TTU GLEAMM microgrid where the field testing will be carried out. (Source: Syndem; used with permission.)

SL Series XR Series TS Series MS Series MT Series
According to Syndem,
its VSM technology
allows solar inverters to
automatically sense and
quickly react to changes
in electricity production
and demand across
the grid.
much larger supplies of solar power into their net-

works while also making solar-based systems more
secure from cyberattacks.
Syndem was selected as a part of SETO’s fiscal
year 2019 funding program, an effort to invest in
new projects that will lower solar electricity costs,
while working to boost solar manufacturing,
reduce red tape, and make solar-based systems
more resilient to cyberattacks. Other awardees
include General Electric, Oak Ridge National Lab-
oratory, Georgia Institute of Technology, San
Diego Gas & Electric, and the Electric Power
Research Institute.
“We are very pleased to see that our thinking
over the last nearly 20 years about future power
systems has been recognized. This award will
accelerate our pace in commercializing the tech-
nology and deploying it worldwide,” said Prof.
M H I -T ™ Built to take Qing-Chang Zhong, IEEE Fellow and founder and
L A M I N AT E D the heat! chief executive officer of Syndem and the Max
BUS BARS FOR McGraw Endowed Chair Professor in Energy and
While traditional
H I G H T E M P E R AT U R E laminated bus bars Power Engineering and Management at the Illinois
A P P L I C AT I O N S are limited to a Institute of Technology, Chicago.
working temperature According to Syndem, its VSM technology allows
of 105°C, Mersen’s solar inverters to automatically sense and quickly
MHi-T bus bar line react to changes in electricity production and
up allows for an demand across the grid. If energy demand is high,
increased working power production increases. If grid voltage
temperatures up to
slumps, the converters will adjust to provide
130°C and 180°C.
appropriate voltage support. The device guides
power generators and consumers to perform these
tasks autonomously without signals from a central
command center—which makes the whole system
cheaper and less vulnerable to cyberattacks.
“Our ultimate goal is to unify all power supply
sources connected to the grid with all the things
M H I -T 1 0 5 ™ that consume electricity from the grid,” stated
Prof. Zhong. “Wind power, solar, electric vehicles,
M H I -T 1 3 0 ™ and storage systems all are different, and it’s
M H I -T 1 8 0 ™ difficult for these players to work together. They
have different currents and different voltages,
and they fight with each other. We have found the
key to harmonizing them so that they can work
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• 400 kHz switching • Graphical control design interface
• 200 kHz vector control execution • Pre-defined or generic topologies
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i n a synchronized the scalability and Technology (now Clarkson Universi-
and democratized If energy demand is field operation of ty), Potsdam, New York, and his M.Sc.
manner.” high, power production Sy ndem’s V S M degree in physics from the University
With this award, t ech nolog y,” s a id of Bombay, India. He is the editor-in-
increases. If grid voltage
Syndem will be fur- P r o f . Beibei Ren, chief of IEEE Power Electronics Mag-
ther advancing the
slumps, the converters an associate profes- azine and a Member of the IEEE. He
VSM tech nolog y will adjust to provide sor a t T T U a nd a is a veteran freelance writer and edi-
for sola r applic a - appropriate voltage Senior Member of tor with more than 35 years of editori-
tions and undertak- support. the IEEE. al experience covering power elec-
i n g f ield t e s t i n g tronics, analog/radio-frequency tech-
(Figure 1) in Texas, nologies, and semiconductors. He has
in par tnership with Texas Tech About the Author worked for leading electronics trade
University (TTU), Group NIRE, and Ashok Bindra (bindra1@verizon publications in the United States,
South Plains Electric Utility. .net) received his M.S. degree from the including Electronics, EE Times,
“We are very pleased to be part of Department of Electrical and Comput- Electronic Design, Power Electronics
this exciting project to demonstrate er Engineering, Clarkson College of Technology, and RF Design.

Passive Components
by Ashok Bindra
Metal Composite Power Inductors

for Automotive Applications
B
ecause the IEEE Applied ments of these applications, the MPXV
Power Electronics Confer- Metal series inductors’ metal composite core
ence and Exposition (APEC) Composite offers high-permeability and high-satu-
2020 in New Orleans, Louisiana, was ration flux density for a stronger mag-
canceled due to the coronavirus netic field. Another advantage is lower
(COVID-19) pandemic, the APEC loss for a more efficient device that
exhibitors have taken to the Inter- minimizes heat to make it suitable for
net to deliver their messages. Global use in designs where thermal consider-
electronic c o m p o n e n t s supplier Copper Metal ations are vital.
Coil Terminal
KEMET Corporation was one of Furthermore, to avoid magnetic
them. Using online tools, KEMET’s flux leakage, the inductors feature
Michael Freitag, director of magnet- FIG 1 The metal composite core offers EMI shielding (Figure 1), a needed fea-
EMI shielding. (Source: KEMET; used
ic, sensor, and actuator product with permission.)
ture for these demanding applications.
management, described the compa- In addition, they are AEC-Q200 com-
ny’s latest magnetic product to IEEE teristics for high-reliability automo- pliant as well as approved to Europe-
Power Electronics Magazine. The tive applications requiring stable an Union (EU) Restriction of Hazard-
supplier demonstrated online a new inductance across a wide range of ous Substances: 2011/65/EU and
family of metal composite power temperatures and cur- (EU)2015/863.
inductors to address the stringent rents. Operating over The p o w e r in -
demands of the automotive elec- a temperature range The supplier demon- ductors come in a
tronic control units (ECU) applica- of −55 °C to +155 °C, variety of surface-
strated online a new
tions, as well as electromagnetic the rated inductance mount device case
family of metal com-
interference (EMI) filters. Other tar- range for the new se- sizes, ranging from
get applications for these new metal ries is 0.10–100 μH at posite power inductors 5 × 5 × 2 to 22 × 22
composite core inductors include 100 kHz (±20% toler- to address the strin- × 13 mm. Because
light-emitting diode h e a d l i g h t s , ance) with a rated dc gent demands of the the metal compos-
meter cluster panels, head-up dis- resistance of 0.48– automotive electronic ite inductors offer
plays, electric water and oil pumps, 341.2 mΩ maximum. high-temperature
control units applica-
and electric power steering. Also, the rated cur- c apabi l it y (up to
tions, as well as elec-
Designed to outperform tradition- rent for the MPXV 155 °C) and low ac-
al ferrite inductors and thereby boost series is 2–90 A. tromagnetic interfer- oustic noise, they
the performance of the company’s Because the new ence filters. are suitable for all
METCOM family, as well as the AEC- power inductors can areas of the vehicle,
Q200 qualified product portfolio, the prov ide ef f ic ient including the chal-
new metal composite core series power conversion while minimizing lenging operating e nv i r on ment s
MPXV offers high-saturation charac- transmission losses, they are recom- found under the hood. In a state-
mended for use in dc–dc switching ment, KEMET’s Senior Vice Presi-
power supplies found in automotive dent and Chief Technology Officer
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 ECUs. To meet the stringent require- Philip Lessner said, “Our experience

a nd ex per tise in provide a depend- versity), Potsdam, New York and his
high per meability able, easy-to-design- M.Sc. degree in physics from the Uni-
The new metal com-
inductor m a t e r i a l in solution.” Accord- versity of Bombay, India. He is the
posite core series
development a nd ing to KEMET, the editor-in-chief of IEEE Power Elec-
production allows us MPXV offers high-satu- MPXV series is avail- tronics Magazine and a Member of
to introduce devices ration characteristics able immediately via the IEEE. He is a veteran freelance
with differentiated for high-reliability KEMET distributors. writer and editor with more than 35
performance to meet automotive applica- years of editorial experience cover-
and exceed the needs
tions requiring stable About the Author ing power electronics, analog/radio-
of the latest applica- Ashok B i n d r a frequency technologies, and semi-
inductance across a
tions in sectors such (bindra1@verizon conductors. He has worked for lead-
as automotive.” He wide range of temper- .net) received his ing electronics trade publications in
added, “With their atures and currents. M.S. degree from the United States, including Electron-
robust performance, the Department of ics, EE Times, Electronic Design,
high reliability and Electrical and Com- Power Electronics Technology, and
energy-saving features, MPXV induc- puter Engineering, Clarkson College RF Design.
tors are a perfect example of this and of Technology (now Clarkson Uni-
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Emerging Opportunities
in Distributed Power
Electronics and
Battery Integration
Setting the stage for an energy storage revolution
by Issa Batarseh and Khalil Alluhaybi
T
he quantum improvement of battery technol- batteries, and power electronics in a single module
ogy in terms of cost, performance efficiency, is a powerful approach for meeting the challenging
and reliability paves the way for a new demands of the distributed solar energy market. Given
electric energy storage revolution. The new recent advances in power electronics and battery tech-
storage systems, when coupled with power nologies, one can now economically, reliably, and
electronics integration approaches, promise to cause safely integrate PVs, batteries, electronics, and protec-
a significant paradigm shift in power electronics tech- tion within a single module.
nology, broadly expanding its application reach. Safe This integration not only removes the need to custom-
and reliable integration of photovoltaic (PV) panels, ize every residential solar system but will usher in new
opportunities for practical, smart, distributed solar solu-
tions in both grid-connected and off-grid applications. For
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 a grid-connected application, the integrated module is an
22 IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE z June 2020 2329-9207/20©2020IEEE

©ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/MEKITIK_BOY
effective approach to reduce the peak load of a household digital signal processors, and digital control technology. By
and lower energy costs to benefit the consumer. For off-grid the close of the last century, the golden age of power elec-
applications, the integration of PVs and batteries offers a tronics was in full swing, fueled by a surge of R&D activities
user-friendly modular energy system, providing opportuni- in all kinds of applications related to the field.
ties for poverty-stricken energy regions. This approach is Today, a new frontier of power electronics technologies
still in the early phases of development, so understanding has been reached. It was made possible by advances in
the major advantages of integration and overcoming the device materials, power-processing control functionalities,
associated challenges would lead to its widespread use. packaging and thermal management technology, and cries
This article addresses the emerging integration issues and for higher energy efficiency due to ever-increasing aware-
uses our current research efforts to provide readers with ness of global warming and environmental pollution. At
examples of technical approaches. the 10th Future of Electronics Power Processing and Con-
version (also known as FEPPCON X) meeting in 2019, the
The Growth of Power Electronics participants were confident that “the application reach of
By the end of the 19th century, humanity was ready to empower electronics will spread everywhere in every phase
brace electricity as part of daily life. All the pieces fell into of industrial, commercial, residential, utility, transporta-
place to enable electricity to be generated, stored, and dis- tion, aerospace, and military environments” [5]–[7]. In fact,
tributed, with the invention and development of compo- today, it is estimated that roughly 30% of processed electri-
nents and systems such as the capacitor, voltaic pile bat- cal power uses power electronics. The total is expected to
tery, inductor, transformer, three-phase power system, and rise to as much as 80% by 2030 [8].
rotating machinery. Although limited, a new era of power The empowerment of power electronics has been made
generation and transmission was ushered in with the global possible by the technological evolution of electrical com-
realization that electrical energy was the lifeblood neces- ponents utilized during electrical power conversion, pro-
sary for the progress of human civilization. Access to elec- cessing, and delivery stages. In fact, one may argue that
tricity was on the rise, and the field of electrical and power the evolution of power electronics will continue to follow
engineering was solidly established. At the same time, a that of power electronics processing components. Just as
new electrical engineering discipline for converting power the previous surge was propelled by the invention and com-
from one form to another to address application-specific mercialization of power semiconductor devices, the new
loads started to emerge. Later, this discipline became momentum in power electronics will be driven by the cost-
known as power electronics, whose main function was to effective commercialization of lithium (Li)-ion batteries.
convert and process power from the point of generation to The quantum improvement of battery technology in terms
the point of the load at the user end. of cost, performance efficiency, and reliability opens
During the early 20th century, the field of power electron- the door for power electronics to embrace batteries
ics was in its infancy [1]–[4]. It could be argued that the disci- as reliable processing components. This will set
pline began with the invention of the mercury arc rectifier in the stage for a new era of power electronics
1902, which converted ac into dc. Gradual improvements in integration technologies with an emphasis
rectifier technology, vacuum tube switching technology, and on system-level design, optimization,
associated passive components continued until the invention and functional modularization.
of the silicon transistor by Bell Labs in 1947, which ushered in This article provides a high-
the solid-state electronics revolution. The following 50 years level technical discussion
witnessed tremendous improvements in power semiconduc- of integrating one PV
tor devices, coupled with advances in integrated circuits, panel and a battery

into one module as an example of a field of power electronics will witness a
powerful approach to address some boost in innovative power electronics
challenges in the emerging distributed
By the close of the last applications. New trends in R&D activi-
smart solar markets. century, the golden ties are expected to grow to support
future designs of modular and smart
age of power electron-
Transitioning From Solar power-processing circuits. This will
Deployment to Integration ics was in full swing, open the door to new emerging entre-
During the past 20 years, PV deploy- fueled by a surge of preneurship and market opportunities.
ment has reached unimagined levels
of penetration. Given the ever-in - R&D activities. The Promise of Storage
creasing reduction of PV system costs, Today, the promise of storage may be
expanding global and environmental received with skepticism by many in
concerns and regulations, and mount- the technical and business communi-
ing governmental and venture capital investment, one may ties. Many correctly argue that since the invention of the bat-
argue that the past two decades can be dubbed as an era of tery in 1800 by Alessandro Volta, the quest for improved bat-
PV deployment, reaching an unfathomed level of integra- tery technology has not stopped. Gradual improvements have
tion. The end of the 20th century saw the advent of tech- been made since then, but serious R&D activities for batteries
nologies that harvested and converted the sun’s unlimited started only when PV penetration became problematic for the
energy, offering the possibility of inexhaustible and inex- power grid and commercialized electric and hybrid vehicles
pensive power sources. However, solar energy’s enormous turned profitable. As a result, electrical storage efficiencies
potential is restricted by the intermittent nature, disreputa- are significantly improving, while prices are falling, a trend
bility, scalability, and cost of solar-based storage technolo- that is expected to continue. The Electric Power Research
gies. New regulations require that storage be included in Institute issued a forecast that Li-ion battery packs will drop
the PV mix. This is why we expect that the next era will to one-quarter of their current price by 2022 [9].
be all about power electronics and energy integration, The initial promise of storage was to address the chal-
as illustrated in Figure 1. The PV cost (modules only) has lenge of intermittency, balancing supply and demand
dropped significantly, by almost 90% from a decade ago. issues, and effectively taking surplus energy for later use.
We can see a clear correlation between PV module prices Today, the power electronics community is called upon to
and the amount of global PV generation and installation. help address several challenges, such as:
We believe that the future grid will be a smart inverter-dom- 1) increasingly stringent grid requirements
inated network. Integrated solar generation coupled with stor- 2) the need to integrate high-power semiconductor devices
age, Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices, and advanced monitoring 3) the drive for lower-cost energy with high efficiency
and control will become the backbone of the modern grid. The and reliability
The Past (2010) The Present (2020) The Future (2030)
Deployment
Integration
PV Module Prices
US$2–3/W US$0.3/W US$0.23/W
Global PV Generation
10-Plus TWh 300-Plus TWh 2,000-Plus TWh
Global PV Installations
10-Plus GW 300-Plus GW 1,000-Plus GW
FIG 1 The transition from PV system deployment to power electronics and energy storage integration.

Stand-Alone
PV Panel
Carrying
Handle Microinverter
Integrated
Battery
Microinverter
and Battery
PV Junction Box
Collapsible,
PV Module
Adjustable Hinge
Grid Tied Stand
Load On–Off Switch
Connector Button to
Operate
the Display
ac Cord
LCD
USB Port
External ac Plug PV Cable
June 2020
Connections Box Input
Connector
Housing for Batteries

and Systems
z IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE

FIG 2 The integrated PV battery module and its applications.
25
4) the ever-increasing demand to integrate millions of IoT PV Module-Level Integration
devices into the grid All the elements of the integrated PV unit–battery module
5) the needs of cybersecurity protocols and systems. operate as a compact unit mechanically attached to the
There is no doubt that each of these challenges can be backside of the PV panel, as shown in Figure 2. The advan-
addressed more effectively and reliability when energy stor- tages of this modular solution include:
age is used. 1) incorporating a single-stage microinverter and Li-ion
The push to develop new, cost-effective, and safe elec- battery pack with smart dynamic control and a battery
tric energy storage devices is intensifying. In the process, a management algorithm
new electric energy storage revolution is coming. It will dis- 2) saving space so that there is no longer a need to place the
rupt the current methods for generating, distributing, and power electronics and battery inside the house
consuming energy in the same way refrigeration changed 3) facilitating a modular approach that enables integrated
the world’s production, distribution, and consumption of components to be connected together to function as a
food. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, revo- virtual power plant
lutionary breakthroughs in electric energy storage have 4) providing a portable solution that supports the ability to
been singled out as perhaps one of today’s leading societal manage the power flow
challenges to address the need to secure the country’s 5) supplying highly stable and predictable energy for both
energy future [10] and transform the electrical grid and stand-alone and grid-tied applications
its resiliency [11]. This is why extensive and significant 6) supporting a plug-and-play feature, which implies a unique
R&D activities for improving energy storage and integra- architecture that integrates the PV panel and microin-
tion technologies are ushering in another revival in power verter with local storage and battery management.
electronics applications. In fact, new storage systems and
approaches promise to cause a significant paradigm shift Module-Level Design Considerations
in power electronics technology, broadly expanding its The following requirements must be taken into consider-
application reach. The remainder of this article discusses ation for a PV unit–battery integrated module to be a suc-
issues related to one area of application, where a PV source cessful design, as illustrated in Figure 3:
and battery are integrated into one PV module to enable 1) the mechanical frame (structural integrity, thermal man-
smart solar distribution. agement, ease of installation and battery pack replacement,
ease of attachment to the PV panel, and light weight)
2) the PV module (low-power thermal coefficient and light
weight)
3) the microinverter architecture (low component counts,
PV-Battery
compact size, and centralized control to manage energy
Integrated
Power Module Mechanical among the power ports)
Electronics Frame 4) battery pack selection (capacity, cycle life, safety, tem-
perature range, and pack dimensions to determine the
type of battery).
Battery PV Module
Technology
Thermal Mechanical Frame
Analysis Integrating power electronics, a battery, and communica-
tion into the backplane of a PV panel facilitates a techno-
FIG 3 The aspects of designing the PV unit–battery inte- logical solution to shorten the installation time and signifi-
grated module.
cantly minimize equipment and maintenance costs. Battery
replacement should be designed so that the PV module
does not have to be disconnected from the mounting
racks. The lifetime and performance of the integrated
Air Flow Air Flow
module elements are highly dependent on temperature.
The integration of the microinverter and battery pack on
Air Gap the back of the PV module will inevitably increase the
operation temperature of the entire system. Suspending
Air Flow the battery pack with no air gap might severely limit heat
Battery and removal through natural convection. On the other hand,
White Coated Power Electronics installing the battery pack at a far distance from the PV
Module Rack module increases the size and weight. One solution is to
Surface
install a battery frame (as pictured in Figure 4), which is
FIG 4 The PV unit–battery module structure with natural air suspended a few centimeters below the PV module by
convection. clips on all four corners.

Battery Integration Challenges the Li-ion cells, which is verified by AllCell Technologies,
The integration of a solar storage system has numerous as shown in Figure 5.
open questions when transferring lab concepts to real-world
applications. High storage device temperatures and aging Aging of Batteries
integrated components have significant impacts on the effi- Aging effects, such as capacity loss and power fade, usually
ciency and reliability of the system. accelerate when storage devices are exposed to higher tem-
peratures. It is true that the rise in temperature leads to an
Thermal Management increase in the instantaneous capacity of the battery. How-
In nonintegrated PV unit–battery systems, the batteries ever, undesired chemical reactions accelerate at elevated
operate at a low temperature compared to
the integrated battery pack. Therefore,
understanding the thermal dynamic func- 100
tion of batteries is essential to lowering Oven Temperature
90 PCM No PCM Ambient
Temperature (°C)
the overall temperature of the integrated
80 Module With 6-mm Insulation
module. An advanced packaging technol- Removed After 20 min
ogy using an inexpensive, lightweight, 70 Module With 6-mm Insulation Plus
60 11-mm PCM Survives 3.5 h
simple material called phase change
material (PCM) will significantly reduce 50
battery performance degradation and 40
safety concerns [12]. An extended battery 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5
Time (h)
lifecycle is guaranteed by using PCM
because this material reduces the risk of External Geometry: 300 × 150 × 150 mm
Initial Temperature: 50 °C
thermal runaway by minimizing high
Ambient Temperature: 100 °C for 3 h
temperature excursions. This thermal- Maximum Cell Temperature: 60 °C
shielding solution enables a battery to be
exposed to extreme temperatures for FIG 5 The comparison of system test data with and without PCM insulation.
extended durations without overheating (Source: AllCell Technologies; used with permission [12].)
Grid
PV Multiport
Mini Inverter
Battery Bank (Li-ion)
(a)
dc–dc dc Bus dc–ac ac Bus

Converter Inverter
dc–ac
Inverter
dc–dc dc–ac Grid

Grid
Converter Inverter
Energy Energy
Storage Storage
(b) (c)
FIG 6 The (a) three-port single PV module, (b) dc-coupled system architecture, and (c) ac-coupled system architecture.

temperatures, negatively impacting The PV Module
the cell’s lifetime through the loss of Temperature and ambient irradiance
active materials. The number of bat-
Understanding the greatly influence the performance of
tery cycles fluctuates during opera- thermal dynamic func- the solar module. Therefore, the opti-
tion because the PV power genera- mal energy yield can be obtained by
tion of batteries is
tion and load demand are not stable. the appropriate selection of the PV
Manufacturers use continuous and essential to lowering module, based on the dominant opera-
uniform cycling to provide battery the overall tempera- tional ambient conditions. The rated
specifications. However, the fluctu- power, temperature coefficient prop-
ating nature of the power output of ture of the integrated erties, and price should be considered
the PV module determines the actual module. to ensure essential desirable charac-
charging and discharging profile of teristics while remaining cost effective
the integrated batteries. This has an for the selection of the PV module. As
impact on the aging characteristics a portable and modular solar system
of the battery, which may not match the specification on solution, the dimensions and weight of the integrated mod-
the datasheet. ule play a significant role in residential applications because
S7-1
C2
V1 S1 S3 S7-2
C1 L3 L1 L2
C4
Port
ort 1 Po
Port 3
V3
Port 2 L4 1:n
V2 S2 S4 S8-2
C3
S8-1
(a) (b)
FIG 7 The three-port microinverter. The (a) circuit schematic and (b) microinverter prototype.
Vs (50 V/div) V3 (100 V/div) VP (50 V/div) iL2 (5 A /div)

V3 (100 V/div)
Vs (50 V/div) iL2 (5 A /div)
VP (50 V/div)
δ1 = 0.628 rad
φ = 0.7 rad
δ1 = 1.884 rad φ = 0.7 rad
(a) (b)
FIG 8 The key waveforms for the transformer primary voltage (Vp), secondary voltage (Vs ), and secondary current. The (a) first and
(b) second power flow scenarios. Tek: Tektronix; div: division.

of limited rooftop weight-carrying whether charging the battery to the
capabilities. The large range of com- desirable state or providing power to
mercially available PV modules gives
The promise of storage the load. Having said that, we believe
the designer the option to choose from may be received with more revenue streams will become
many suitable candidates for integra- practical during the coming years. It is
skepticism by many in
ted module design. important to note that the three-port
the technical and busi- integrated module promises a reduc-
Financial Viability ness communities. tion of both installations and labor
There are several financial models cur- costs. More detailed financial compari-
rently being discussed that show dis- sons need to be carried out.
tributed energy storage and PV at the
customer side becoming a financially viable solution. Many Power Electronics
such models have been shown to be viable when it comes to
commercial customers. For example, during peak hours, the System Architecture
integrated module discharges all the energy stored in the bat- Figure 6(a) and (b) presents a simplified block diagram for a
tery to power the load, and thus less energy is drawn from three-port single PV module design and its associated dc-
the grid. During off-peak hours, the PV priority can be varied, coupled system architecture, respectively. Compared with
– V0 +
C3
C CS1
Battery S3 D3 CS3 r D1 S1 PV
n:1
C2 i Lr C1
B A
Lr
S4 D4 Lm D2 S2
CS4 CS2
(a) (b)
FIG 9 The dual-input LLC microinverter. The (a) circuit schematic and (b) microinverter prototype.
ILr ILr
VAB
VAB
S1
S3
S2 S4
(a) (b)
FIG 10 Experimental waveforms for the single-input source scenario with (a) only a PV unit providing power and (b) only a battery
providing power. GS/s: gigasamples per second; 10M: 10 mega. (Source: NSF Research Project #1810733.)

the ac-coupled architecture, the dc-coupled design is a very
promising approach to implement the integration of PVs
94.5
and battery storage, as illustrated in Figure 6(b), due to its
high conversion efficiency, high integration, compactness,
and easy energy management. However, the high dc battery
94 voltage will definitely degrade the battery performance
Efficiency (%)
and lifespan, especially with widely used Li-ion batteries.

To overcome this battery shortcoming, we expect to take
93.5
the integration granularity to a PV panel scale and reduce
the battery voltage to a low level that is compatible with the
93 PV panel voltage. This will significantly guarantee the bat-
tery lifespan and simplify battery maintenance. In addition
to these benefits, there are inherent microinverter advan-
92.5
100 120 140 160 180 200 220 240 260 280 300 tages, such as 1) improved system efficiency, 2) lower instal-
Input Power (W) lation costs, 3) plug-and-play operation, and 4) enhanced
flexibility and modularity. Last but not least, the power gen-
eration from the integrated PV panel, as with a virtual small-
FIG 11 The efficiency plot when VPV = 40 V and Vbat = 60 V. scale power plant, is controllable.
Lf
D1
Grid
SP 1 SP 2 Cf
+
Sbat
VPV Cdc
– Third Port
+ D2
Battery
Sm
First Port
CB SN 1 SN 2
–
Second Port
(a) (b)
FIG 12 The three-port microinverter. The (a) circuit schematic and (b) microinverter prototype.
Grid Voltage
Magnetizing Current ILM Sm Driver
Sbat Driver
Secondary Current i2 Grid Current

Spl Driver
(a) (b) (c)
FIG 13 Key waveforms, including the (a) magnetizing and secondary current waveforms, (b) driver signals, and (c) output volt-
age and current waveforms. MS/s: megasamples per second.

Three-Port Topology Candidates the PV port was connected, its voltage
In this section, several topology candi- was set at 40 V, and when battery port
dates are given and built to test their
The dc-coupled design was connected, its voltage was at its
performance and feasibility for PV is a very promising nominal level of 60 V. The efficiency
module–battery integration. A bidirec- curve measured on the prototype is
approach to imple-
tional ac-link microinverter topology presented in Figure 11.
that is based on the concept of a dual ment the integration The schematic for a dual-input (PV
active bridge (DAB) converter is illus- of PVs and battery unit–battery) single-stage microinverter
trated in Figure 7 [13]. The proposed that is derived from a conventional
converter retains all the merits of a storage. flyback inverter is shown in Figure 12
DAB converter (low-cost design, sim- [15]. There are three advantages to this
ple control implementation, and ease system. First, only one switch (S bat)
of achieving soft switching) while con- and one diode (D2) are added to inte-
verting dc to ac without needing a decoupling capacitor. grate the battery with the PV panel. Second, during any oper-
The leakage inductor of the transformer acts as an ac link ation scenario (there are six switches in the topology), either
for the conversion of high-frequency ac to low-frequency ac. one or two switches are working at high frequency, while
An output filter is placed to generate a smooth sinusoidal the rest of the switches are either off or switching under the
output current. The key waveforms verify the performance line frequency to generate sinusoidal voltage for the grid.
of the converter during the first and second power flow sce- This results in low power loss and thus relatively high effi-
narios, in which energy travels from the PV or battery to the ciency. Third, power decoupling is realized by the battery
load, as shown in Figure 8. port, which acts as a snubber circuit. The leakage energy is
In a PV microinverter architecture where isolation is recycled through it, leading to higher conversion efficiency.
required, an LLC resonant converter is the most common The corresponding experimental results from releasing
topology, due to its wide input voltage range, full-range soft energy to the grid and charging the battery with surplus
switching, and low circulating current. Figure 9 gives the power from only the PV unit are presented in Figure 13.
proposed isolated dc–dc converter that interfaces with When switch S m turns off, energy stored in the magne-
one PV panel and a battery energy storage system [14]. The tizing inductance is transferred to the battery. Secondary
proposed dual-input LLC converter can have four operat- switches turn on when the current falls to a certain level.
ing power flow scenarios. The energy harvested from Figure 14 provides corresponding experimental results for
the PV and battery is transferred through only one dc–dc the power flow scenario in which energy travels from the
converter, which greatly reduces component counts and PV module and battery as backup power to the grid. The
improves system reliability and efficiency. Each source is energy stored in the battery increases the magnetizing cur-
connected to a half-bridge circuit so that the LLC resonant rent by turning on switch S bat .
tank operates in both half- and full-bridge configurations. The use of intelligent energy management systems enhan-
Figure 10 shows the steady-state experimental waveforms ces the efficiency and reliability of the battery-based sys-
of the dual-input LLC converter operating in a single-input tem by accomplishing the following objectives: 1) the battery
scenario with a PV source and battery, respectively. When is used when PV input power is not available or as backup
Magnetizing Current ILM

Sm Driver Grid Voltage
Sbat Driver
Secondary Current i2
Grid Current
Spl Driver
(a) (b) (c)
FIG 14 Key waveforms, including the (a) magnetizing and secondary current waveforms, (b) driver signals, and (c) output voltage
and current waveforms.

power when the PV source is out of the acceptable tolerance University, Medina, Saudi Arabia, and his M.S degree in elec-
range and 2) the misalignment between the high load demand trical engineering from the University of Central Florida
period during the night and PV power generation period dur- (UCF), Orlando, in 2011 and 2017, respectively. He is cur-
ing the day limits the simultaneous use of PV power for self- rently working toward his Ph.D. degree in electrical engi-
consumption. Therefore, the battery system maximizes self- neering at UCF. His research interests include three-port
consumption by storing surplus PV energy during the day and microinverter topologies for photovoltaic applications, bat-
delivering that power to satisfy the load demand at night. tery management systems, efficiency optimization of dc–ac
inverters, and soft switching techniques.
Summary
Since early last century, power electronics has followed the References
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for a new electric energy storage revolution that will disrupt Introduction],” IEEE Ind. Electron. Mag., vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 7–11, 14, 2009. doi:
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broadly expanding its application reach. cessing and conversion: Highlights from FEPPCON IX,” in IEEE Power Elec-
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from low efficiency and high cost. This is due to the non- technology for renewable energy system integration,” in Proc. Int. Conf.
optimal configuration of multiple conversion stages. The Renewable Energy Research and Applications (ICRERA), Palermo, Italy,
key innovation is to develop a solution with a novel archi- 2015, pp. 1618–1626. doi: 10.1109/ICRERA.2015.7418680.
tecture that integrates smart power electronics technology [7] D. Tan, “Power electronics in 2025 and beyond: A focus on power elec-
with local storage. Battery management is used to harvest tronics and systems technology,” IEEE Power Electron. Mag., vol. 4, no. 4,
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connection and islanded-mode applications. The proposed [8] GreenDiamond, “Project overview.” Accessed on: Jan. 6, 2020. [Online].
distributed, scalable, and efficient system addresses many Available: www.greendiamond-project.eu/project-overview/
PV penetration concerns ahead of time while enabling easy [9] J. P. Banks, “The rise of electricity storage: Something for everybody,” Brook-
and cost-effective installation, maintenance, and opera- ings, Washington, D.C., July 28, 2016. [Online]. Available: www.brookings.edu/
tion. The use of local storage within the PV panel with util- opinions/the-rise-of-electricity-storage-something-for-everybody/
ity access enables enhanced functionality that includes [10] “DoE report on basic research needs in electric energy storage,” Depart-
supporting the grid, providing load shifting and peak shav- ment of Energy, Washington, D.C., 2007. [Online]. Available: https://science
ing, minimizing transmission and distribution losses, and .energy.gov/~/media/bes/pdf/reports/files/ees_rpt_print.pdf
optimizing local energy production and consumption. This [11] “DoE announces funding to support long-duration energy storage,”
will result in accelerated PV deployment through simplified Department of Energy, Washington, D.C., May 1, 2018. [Online]. Available:
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-support-long-duration-energy-storage
About the Authors [12] “AllCell overview,” AllCell Technol., Chicago. Accessed on: Jan. 22, 2020.
Issa Batarseh (issa.batarseh@ucf.edu) received his [Online]. Available: www.allcelltech.com/index.php/about-us/allcell-overview
B.S. degree in electrical and computer engineering and his [13] A. Bhattacharjee, “Development of multiport bidirectional converter for
M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the photovoltaic and energy storage integration,” Ph.D. dissertation, Dept. Elec.
University of Illinois, Chicago, in 1983, 1985, and 1990, Comp. Eng., Univ. Central Florida, Orlando.
respectively. He is currently a professor of electrical engi- [14] S. Milad Tayebi, X. Chen, A. Bhattacharjee and I. Batarseh, “Design and
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He is a Fellow of the IEEE. voltaic systems,” Ph.D. dissertation, Dept. Elec. Comp. Eng., Univ. Central
Khalil Alluhaybi (eng.khalil@knights.ucf.edu) recei- Florida, Orlando.
ved his B.S. degree in electrical engineering from Taibah

FEPPCON X: Part 2
Four summaries from the technical sessions
MAIN PHOTO: CREDIT: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/GREMLIN, POLAR BEAR: ©ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/MIKE_KIEV
by Ashok Bindra
I
n the December 2019 issue of IEEE Power Electronics ■ “Power Electronics Design Methods and Automation in
Magazine, we presented summaries of three technical the Digital Era,” by Prof. Antonio J. Marques Cardoso, the
sessions and a plenary talk as the first part of the 10th Department of Electromechanical Engineering, the Uni-
IEEE Future of Electronic Power Processing and Con- versity of Beira Interior, Covilhã, Portugal
version (FEPPCON X), which was held in June 2019 in ■ “Future of Power Electronics Circuits,” by Prof. Robert
Tromso, Norway. They included “Batteries as Energy Storage Pilawa-Podgurski, the Department of Electrical Engineer-
Technology,” by Prof. Braham Ferreira, “Power Electronics ing and Computer Sciences, the University of California,
System View of Energy Storage,” by Prof. Sudip K. Mazumder, Berkeley
and “New Technology and Solutions Needed for High-Power ■ “Energy Access: A New Power Electronics Story,” by
Applications,” by Prof. Jin Wang. The keynote talk, “Global Cli- Prof. Jelena Popovic, the Power Electronics Group of the
mate Change,” by Kim Holmén, was covered by yours truly. University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands.
This issue of IEEE Power Electronics Magazine intro-
duces the second part of the FEPPCON X workshop. Part 2 About the Author
presents the following four additional summaries from the Ashok Bindra (bindra1@verizon.net) is the editor-in-chief
technical sessions at FEPPCON X: of IEEE Power Electronics Magazine and a Member of
■ “Future of Control and Communication,” by Prof. Rolan- the IEEE. He is a veteran freelance writer and editor
do Burgos, the Bradley Department of Electrical and with more than 35 years of editorial experience covering
Computer Engineering, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg power electronics, analog/radio-frequency technologies,
and semiconductors.
Date of current version: 16 June 2020
2329-9207/20©2020IEEE June 2020 z IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE 33

The Future of Control
and Communication
Power electronics-enabled power grids
by Rolando Burgos and Jian Sun
S
ession B, “Future of Control and Communication” The proceedings during the session evolved naturally
at the 10th IEEE Future of Electronics Power Pro- into the impact that control and communication technol-
cessing and Conversion (FEPPCON X) 2019, had as ogy will have on the future power grid. The position pre-
its main goal to delve into the opportunities and sentations by Prof. Ilic and Prof. Boroyevich, specifically,
challenges that future control and communication highlighted the imminent changes at the power grid level
capabilities will bring to power electronics and its numerous that power electronics are triggering by enabling alterna-
applications with an emphasis on the power grid and its tive system architectures, which will, in turn, require new
future evolution. With a panel comprising two National operation and planning procedures, modeling and design
Academy of Engineering members, Einar Larsen and Dushan tools, and standards and protocols to be developed. This
Boroyevich; two renowned worldwide experts in the field, will expectedly translate into modular power converters or
Prof. Marija Ilic and Prof. Herbert Ginn III; together with the fractal power conversion networks empowered by distrib-
organizers, the session included discussions that actively uted controls with subnanosecond synchronization capa-
involved the FEPPCON X attendees seeking to explore the bilities and “cloud-type” software allocation and dis-
potential future impact of the following initiatives: tribution that will render possible the power flow control,
■■the increased computational power and communication operation, stabilization, and protection of what is expected
capacity of digital systems enabling advanced control to be an increasingly more complex grid infrastructure (Fig-
capabilities and new power converter and power conver- ures 1 and 2). The correlation between function, temporal,
sion functions
■■a seemingly limitless data storage and
processing capacity and the impact of
data-driven controls, diagnostics, prog-
nostics, and artificial intelligence Local
Controller
■■advancements in control theory and
methods improving converter- and sys- Star Ring Bus Tree Mesh …
tem-level performance as well as the Control
understanding of system-level dynamic Network
interactions and stability challenges Architecture
■■newly enabled electrical power system
architectures and the possibility of alter- Local Local Local
native power flow control methods and Controller Controller Controller
energy management strategies Fiber-Optic Fiber-Optic … Fiber-Optic
Cables Cables Cables
■■the increasing deployment of renewable
energy sources and continuous increase in
electrical loads that are approaching the Node 1 Node 2 Node N
generation capacity of electrical systems.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPEL.2020.2988076 FIG 1 A distributed digital control network architecture for modular power
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 electronics converters.

and technology-based partitioning in electromechanical technology and
power electronics was herein estab- hence eliminating the need to have
lished as well, illustrating how this
Regarding controls, such design requirements or operat-
quantum approach will be behind specifically grid-level ing characteristics. In effect, power
the modeling, handling, and opera- converters can respond in principle
controls, it was con-
tion of such systems. within a switching cycle, which is in
The presentations were followed curred that hierarchi- the microsecond range with either
by a lively exchange of ideas and view- cal models capturing silicon or wide-bandgap-based power
points among the panel members and semiconductor (silicon carbide and
the attendees, who initially reiterated the dynamic, control- gallium nitride) technologies. Accord-
the important point that the integra- dependent behavior of ingly, it was concluded that these
tion of grid power electronics should new capabilities have the potential
be a piecemeal process ensuring full power converters will to enable a new paradigm for system
compatibility with the existent oper- be needed to simulate protection matching the main re -
ating paradigm and infrastructure. quirements of electrical systems, be
Although the concept of “why change
and accurately predict it the present power grid under high
something that has worked for 100 the behavior of future penetration of power electronics or
years” arose, it was clear that change simply new power grid architectures
itself is being brought by the inher-
power grids. as those mentioned above.
ent growth in demand and ongoing Regarding controls, specifically
integration of distributed and renew- grid-level controls, it was concurred
able energy sources worldwide, i.e., that the transforma- that hierarchical models capturing the dynamic, con-
tion is occurring regardless—it is already set in motion. trol-dependent behavior of power converters will be
Furthermore, it was acknowledged that the grid is indeed needed to simulate and accurately predict the behav-
no longer the unidirectional generation-to-consumption ior of future power grids. This will make it possible
legacy electrical system of the past. For the same reason, to effectively capture all releva nt dy namic power
the use of power converters to support the grid voltage converter phenomena at the different time scales of
and frequency through reactive and active power flow interest. This hierarchical approach, which breaks
control was perceived favorably and deemed necessary down the problem and reduces the complexity of
at this point, but the impact associated with the inher- both power converters and electrical grids, is what
ent dynamic response of power converters should be will also enable the control of these future systems of
accounted for to avoid the onset of dynamic interactions increased complexity. Along these lines, the operation
and possible unstable conditions.
Similarly, the need to adopt grid-forming controls for
grid-tied inverters was viewed as positive, too, where power
Transceivers
electronics are masked from a control standpoint to pro-
vide voltage regulation, frequency support, and other func-
tions provided by synchronous generators in today’s power
system. Considered a step in the right direction, this emula- Master Clk
tion could later be exploited by enabling converters to fully VCXO FPGA
utilize their fast-response capabilities, acting as damping
agents, for instance, as well as protection mechanisms
given their inherent current control capacity. Finally, it was Slave 2 Clk
also concluded that, to fully utilize power converters, new
system architectures would have to be developed, among Slave 1 Clk
which dc grids and energy-packet or quantized power
transfer networks were mentioned as examples due to their
Jitter: ~1 ns
transformative and decoupled power processing nature.
A prevalent concern brought throughout the discussion,
from a legacy standpoint, was that power converters can-
~1.6 ns
not match the overload capacity brandished by traditional
power apparatuses. Although this may appear to be a dis-
advantage at first, it was discussed how power converters
FIG 2 A digital controller with digital–analog syntonization
enable the adoption of alternative protection schemes limit- architecture demonstrating a 1-ns synchronization capacity
ing and controlling fault currents, effectively extinguishing across three network nodes. (Source: Center for Power Elec-
them at response rates that are inconceivable with present tronics Systems, Virginia Tech.)

of autonomous, plug-and-play-type systems with mini- professor with the Center for Power Electronics Systems
mal coordination in their power flow and energy man- in the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer
agement was foreseen. Engineering, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State Uni-
The session concluded with a positive outlook of the versity, Blacksburg.
ongoing changes that are currently transforming the grid Jian Sun (jsun@rpi.edu) received his B.S. degree in
and its capabilities. The attendees also acknowledged electrical engineering from the Nanjing University of Aero-
the multiple opportunities in new emerging regions to nautics and Astronautics, China, in 1984, his M.S. degree in
develop new power networks virtually from scratch, electrical engineering from the Beijing University of Aero-
where the role of power electronics would be preponder- nautics and Astronautics in 1989, and his Ph.D. degree in
ant from the beginning. electrical engineering from the University of Paderborn,
Germany, in 1995. He is a professor in the Department of
About the Authors Electrical, Computer, and Systems Engineering, Rensselaer
Rolando Burgos (roburgos@vt.edu) received his B.S., Polytechnic Institute (RPI), Troy, New York. He is also the
M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Concep- director of the New York State Center for Future Energy
ción, Chile, in 1995, 1999, and 2002, respectively. He is a Systems, RPI.
Power Electronics Design

Methods and Automation
in the Digital Era
Evolution of design automation tools
by Antonio J. Marques Cardoso
L
ast June at the 10th IEEE Future of Electronic Scandic Ishavshotel in Tromso, Norway. To foresee the
Power Processing and Conversion (FEPPCON X) evolution of design automation tools in the power sys-
workshop, I chaired the session “Power Electron- tems arena, this session offered presentations from two
ics Design Methods and Automation in the Era of distinguished speakers, Prof. Alan Mantooth from the Uni-
Digitalization,” which was held 26 June 2019 at versity of Arkansas, Fayetteville, and Prof. Johann W.
Kolar from ETH Zurich, Switzerland.
In his presentation “Power Electronics Design Methods
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 and Automation in the Era of Digitalization,” Prof. Mantooth

initiated the session by anticipating performance. In reality, the current
the following potentially controver- situation demands more automation,
sial conclusions:
Prof. Mantooth contin- concluded Prof. Mantooth.
■■power electronics design is lacking ued by stating that Also, based on the road map to
in automation Power Electronics Design 4.0 (Fig-
what limits penetra-
■■current approaches limit pene- ure 3), Prof. Mantooth questioned the
tration tion is not just nomi- current PELS composition to achieve
■■Power Electronics Design 4.0
nal design, but robust- the road map’s demanding targets. He
demands a change in the IEEE would like to see a PELS initiative,
Power Electronics Society (PELS) ness, resiliency, and comprising the right folks, to drive
composition. reliability. this road map in the future.
Subsequently, Prof. Ma ntoot h Continuing, Prof. Mantooth pre-
pre sented some evidence to sup- sented the second Design Automa-
port his initial claims: the multidis- tion for Power Electronics workshop,
ciplinary integrated design methodology (Figure 1) which was held on 6 September 2019 at the same venue
and the multidisciplinary hierarchical optimization as that of the PELS-sponsored European Conference on
design flowchart (Figure 2). These illustrations high- Power Electronics and Applications at the Magazzini del
lighted key bottlenecks limiting automation in power Cotone Conference Center in Genova, Italy. The intent here
systems, such as the difficulties of combining system- was to understand the problems hindering the growth of
level with component-level designs, the absence of design automation in power electronics and how best to
industry interchangeable models, the lack of software address them. It brought together experts in both power
standards, and the need for better algorithms and open electronics and design automation from the academia and
source libraries. industry, all of whom presented their perspectives on the
Prof. Mantooth continued by stating that what limits emerging needs.
penetration is not just nominal design, but robustness, Finally, several illustrative examples taken from the
resiliency, and reliability. Although certain applications Workshop on Wide Bandgap Power Devices and Applica-
with specific voltage/current/power specifications may tions Asia 2019 held in Taipei, Taiwan, regarding advances
first see the penetration of automated design tools, the key in silicon carbide power integrated circuits were presented
barrier to design automation seems to be the device data and discussed, which included µ-cooled flip-chip modules
sheets, which are not a true representation of the device’s and integrated CMOS gate drivers.
Solid-State Systems
Physics and Control
Parameter Order
Reduction Circuits and
Electromagnetics Extraction
Topologies
R, L, C Time-Scale
Extraction Analysis Data and Separation
Design Process Control

Ordinary Partial
Solid-Body Model Algebraic
Differential Differential
Defeaturing Database Equations Equations
Geometry Equations
• Optimization • Analysis • Modeling
Rθ, Cθ Model Parameter Exchange Cost

Extraction Drivers
Thermodynamics Manufacturing
Parameter Statistical
Extraction Reliability
Structural Physics
Mechanics of Failures
FIG 1 A multidisciplinary integrated design methodology.

38
System Functionality
IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE

System Architecture Mission Profile
Voltages, and so on Electric Power System Design Optimization Availability,
and so on
z June 2020
Circuit Topology Converter Operating Conditions and Specifications
Electrical
Modulation, Control, Interface
Switching Frequency, Constraints
MOSFETs, Diodes, Converter Model Converter Model Converter Model EMI,
L, C, . . . Harmonics,
Converter Design Optimization PQ, Stability, . . .
Component Operating Conditions and Specifications

Packaging
Materials, Heatsinks,
Mechanical Component Component Component Component Component Component Component Physical
Arrangements, and so on Model Model Model Model Model Model Model Implementation
Constraints
Component Design Optimization Geometry,
Material, Thermal,
and so on
Optimizer
Pareto Front With Minimize System Size and Loss
Exhaustive Search
FIG 2 A multidisciplinary hierarchical optimization design flowchart. EMI: electromagnetic interference; PQ: power quality.
Peeking Into the Future ■■Automated design tools for certain
Prof. Kolar focused his presentation applications with specific voltage/
on the topics of automated design, dig-
Prof. Kolar’s talk sug- current/power levels is probably
ital twin, and Industry 4.0. Under the gested that automa- the first set of applications.
scope of automated design, he dis- ■■One of the key barriers to design
tion can deliver the
cussed the design and performance automation seems to be that the
spaces [Figure 4(a) and (b)], showing technologies needed device data sheets are not a true
the functions and parameters that divide to optimally map representation of the device’s
the two. In fact, his talk suggested that performance.
automation can deliver the technologies the design space into ■■Design automation can simpli-
needed to optimally map the design the performance fy the design of passive compo-
space into the performance space. In nents, introduce s e n s i t i v i t y
addition, he also introduced absolute space. ana lysis, affect component toler-
performance limits, labeled as a Pareto ances on system performance,
front. Concurrently, Prof. Kolar also and so forth.
introduced the concept of a digital twin, which means that ■■Digital twin—physics-based digital mirror image.
for every physical device there is a digital mirror image. The digital replica of a physical asset such as a power
Based on the aforementioned presentations and the in- electronic converter/system, which can merge live data
volved discussion that ensued, the following general con- from its physical counterpart using an interactive visu-
clusions were drawn jointly by myself and Prof. Prasad al interface, has the potential to drastically enhance
Enjeti of Texas A&M University: performance.
■■Current power electronics design is lacking in automa- ■■Current approaches limit penetration.
tion, but it is not just nominal design, it is also missing ■■Power Electronics Design 4.0 demands a change in PELS
the following characteristics: composition.
• robustness (design centering and tolerancing, and ■■A second workshop on design automation has
uncertainty) been organized. A new initiative on design automa-
• resiliency (over environment and compromise) tion in power electronics will probably have good
• reliability. traction.
End-to-End Horizon of Modeling and Simulation (Specification → Recycling)

Autonomous Design → Design 4.0
– Independent Generation of
Full Designs and the Graphical
Representation of Performances/
Sensitivities/Diversities for Final
Augmented Design (Experts) User Judgment, and so on
– Suggestion of Design
Details to the User Based on
Assisted Design
Previous Designs,
Including Comprehensive – Support of the User With
Performance Indication, and so on an Abstracted Database of
in Graphical Form Former Design and Application
Experience Generated by
Machine Learning to
Reduce Time for Parametrization,
State of the Art Definition of Limits, and so on
– Models and Simulation/
Optimization Structure
Defined by the User
– Limited Interactive Features
– Fragmented/High License Costs
Multiobjective Design for Cost/Volume Target/Manufacturing/Testing/Reliability/Recycling

The Only Way to Survive in a World of Exponentially Increasing Knowledge Bases/Number of Papers
FIG 3 The road map to Power Electronics Design 4.0.

Performance Space η
• Efficiency
• Power Density
• Costs ρ
• Reliability • Evaluation Formulas
Performance Space • Other.
S S
• Lifetime Models
f (x, k )
Costs • Cost Models
System
Design Space • Other.
• Phase-Shift dc/dc Conversion
• Resonant dc/dc Conversion • Specifications
• dc Link ac/ac Conversion • Operation Limits
• Matrix ac/ac Conversion • Converter Topology
• Other. • Modulation Scheme
Components m2 • Control Concept
• Power Semiconductor • Operation Mode
• Interconnections • Operating Frequency
• Inductors, Transformation • Other.
• Capacitors
• Control Circuit • Doping Profiles
• Other. m1 • Geometric Properties
Materials • Winding Arrangements
• Magnetic Core Geometries
• Semiconductor Material
• Other.
• Conductor Material
• Magnetic Material
• Dielectric Material
• Other.
Mathematical Description of the Mapping “Technologies” → “System Performance”

(a)
Based on Mathematical Model of the Technology Mapping

Multiobjective Optimization → Best Utilization of the “Design Space”
Identifies Absolute Performance Limits → Pareto Front/Surface
xi η
η
S
∆p
P
S P
∆k
∂η
sηρρ =
D ∂ρ P
kl ρ ρ
Design Space Performance Space
S S
Clarifies Sensitivity ∆p/∆k to Improvements of Technologies
Trade-Off Analysis
(b)
FIG 4 (a) The automated design maps plot space into performance and (b) identify its absolute performance limits, denoted as
the Pareto front.
About the Author neering, at the University of Beira Interior (UBI), Covilhã,
Antonio J. Marques Cardoso (ajmcardoso@ieee.org) Portugal, and the director of the Electromechatronic Sys-
received his Dipl. Eng., Dr. Eng., and habilitation degrees tems Research Centre at UBI. His current research interests
from the University of Coimbra, Portugal, in 1985, 1995, and are in fault diagnosis and fault tolerance in electrical
2008, respectively, all in electrical engineering. He is a full machines, power electronics, and drives. He is a Senior
professor in the Department of Electromechanical Engi- Member of the IEEE.

The Future of Power
Electronics Circuits
New technologies and managed complexity will drive the future
by Robert Pilawa-Podgurski
T
he field of power electronics advances through In the first session, Prof. Kolar presented his vision for
a number of different innovations, ranging from identifying and addressing important development of power
new and better semiconductors (e.g., power electronics core technologies. His presentation focused on
MOSFET, insulated-gate bipolar transistor, gal- the five areas of topology, components, control, design, and
lium nitride, silicon carbide), manufacturing. Following a discussion on
to improved passive components en - the required performance improvements
abled through material science break- Thanks to digital in power density, costs, failure rates, and
throughs. Moreover, through improved more, Prof. Kolar provided a brief histori-
control and
integration and packaging, higher per- cal review of the key technologies that have
formance and more complex circuits improved simula- yielded dramatic improvement in power
can be implemented. Thanks to digital tion tools, new cir- electronics (Figure 1). The key question dis-
control and improved simulation tools, cussed in this session was what new tech-
new circuit topologies that better utilize cuit topologies nology or solution will bring another 10×
the active and passive devices can be that better utilize improvement in performance (“moon-shot”
implemented in practical designs. At the technologies). Wide bandgap (WBG) power
10th IEEE Future of Electronic Power the active and semiconductors appear to be one such
Processing and Conversion (FEPPCON X), passive devices promising technology, but the increased
several invited speakers and partici- switching speed also brings significant
pants presented viewpoints and dis-
can be implement- challenges in packaging and electromag-
cussed ideas in the session “Future of ed in practical netic interference, making WBG technology
Power Electronics Circuits.” The two a double-edged sword. A key message of
invited speakers were Prof. Johann
designs. this presentation was that to fully reap the
Kolar of Power Electronic Systems Lab- benefits of faster devices, more advanced
oratory at ETH Zurich, Switzerland, and designs must be considered that mitigate
Prof. David Perreault of the Power Electronics Research some of the drawbacks of higher di/dt and dv/dt.
Group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cam- Another approach that may bring significant performan-
bridge. The session also included two invited panelists, ce improvements is the general concept of series and par-
Dr. Isik Kizilyalli of the Advanced Research Project allel interleaving. Examples of multilevel and multiphase
Agency for Energy (ARPA-E), Washington, D.C., and Prof. designs were discussed to highlight the performance ben-
Cian O’Mathuna of Tyndall Institute, University College efits, with examples from the Google Little Box Challenge
Cork, Ireland. In addition, Prof. Yan-Fei Liu of Queen’s supporting this case. It was also noted that much of the cost
University, Canada, served as note-taker and panelist. and power-density improvement relies on advanced pack-
Finally, serving as session organizer and panelist was aging, and that 3D packaging and heterogeneous integra-
Prof. Robert Pilawa-Podgurski of the University of Cali- tion are important technologies for future research direc-
fornia, Berkeley. tions, with some questions of how research in this area
should best be carried out in university laboratories.
Prof. Perreault’s presentation highlighted how the require-
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 ments for future power electronics vary with applications,

and in addition to lower cost, greater per- power electronics. Here also, magnetics
formance is required. To date, passive What new tech- prove to be difficult to miniaturize, where
components still dominate size, weight, both printed circuit board embedded
and loss of many power electronics sys- nology or solution magnetics a nd magnetics on silicon
tems, and magnetics are especially chal- will bring another remain active research topics. Finally,
lenging to miniaturize. Consequently, Prof. O’Mathuna cautioned that with
design of improved high-frequency
10× improvement the expected dramatic increase in the
power magnetics remains a high-impact in performance number of IoT devices, sustainable IoT
research challenge, where both better must be considered, where also power
high-frequency magnetic materials and
(“moon-shot” electronics components must be recy-
designs that address skin and proximity technologies). clable or even dissolvable as they spread
effects can yield greatly improved perfor- in our environment.
mance (Figure 2). Dr. Kizilyalli provided an important
Another important trend identified by Prof. Perreault government and society perspective on the challenges that
was the judicious utilization of higher complexity to lever- we face in terms of decarbonization, global emissions, and
age technology advances (managed complexity). Thanks the increased amount of electric power that flows through
to advances in semiconductor devices, integrated cir- power converters. He highlighted the many applications,
cuits, controls, and passive integration techniques, more in particular at voltage levels above 600 V, that would
sophisticated and complex power conversion approaches benefit from WBG devices. However, circuit topologies,
are becoming feasible. This breaks from the traditional application-specific architectures, control, and packing
approach of desiring the simplest solution possible. Exam- are all areas that are lacking for fully taking advantage of
ples from the hybrid switched-capacitor power-converter the new WBG devices. Areas of risk that must be retired
architectures were presented to illustrate this trend. before WBG devices can be widely adopted include sys-
Finally, Prof. Perreault provided a perspective of other tem integration, device design and fabrication, proven
potential energy storage mechanisms, such as piezoelec- reliability, and cost. Dr. Kizilyalli concluded by present-
trics, which offer fundamentally higher energy densities ing several ongoing U.S. government initiatives that are
than inductors and capacitors, but have yet to be captured trying to solve these problems and presented the partici-
in practical designs. pants with the challenge of achieving truly high-voltage
Prof. O’Mathuna addressed opportunities and chal- (20+ kV) semiconductors.
lenges for power electronics at smaller physical scales, In the follow-up discussion, participants were invited to
driven by edge computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), share their views and perspectives on the future of power
wearable electronics, and fully on-chip integration of electronics circuits. A key theme that was voiced several times
S-Curve of Power Electronics

Power Electronics 1.0 → Power Electronics 4.0
Identify “X-Concepts”/“Moon-Shot” Technologies
10× Improvement Not Only 10% !
1) WBG Semiconductors
2) Multicell/Level Concepts
3) 3D Packaging/Integration
4) Automated Design 4.0
Super-Junct. Techn./WBG
Digital Power
Modeling and Simulation 3.0
Replacement
Established
Emerging
(Disruptive) Power MOSFETs and IGBTs

Microelectronics
Mature
Technology
Circuit Topologies
Performance
Modulation Concepts
II Control Concepts 2.0
I SCRs/Diodes
III
Solid-State Devices
Existing 1.0
Technology
2025
Effort/Time
1958 2015
FIG 1 A historical review of key technologies and future 10× technologies. SCR: silicon-controlled rectifier; Junct.: junction; Techn.:
technology. (Source: Prof. Johann Kolar; used with permission.)

Performance Factor B0 f : Power Handling at Constant Loss Density and Volume
Standard Performance Factor
160
120 Low-Permeability
HF-Magnetic Materials
F = Bf (mT . MHz)
80
" Widely Used Commercial Power
Magnetic Materials
40
0
0.01 0.1 1 10 100
Frequency (MHz)
Ferrox. [28] C2025 CM48 N40 [7] 52 67 [7] M2 M5 P [7]

4F1 C2050 CM5 XCK 61 68 M3 HiEff 13 17 [7]
C2010 C2075 N40 XTH2 67 M M3 [7] Micro 2
FIG 2 Design of improved high-frequency power magnetics continues to challenge researchers. (Source: [1].)
was the challenges of magnetics. In addition to continued can be realized through power electronics. In terms of true
improvement in magnetic material and transformer/induc- moon-shot technologies, the participants were looking for-
tor structures, circuit topologies that inherently rely less on ward to identifying and developing new active switches
magnetic components were viewed as a promising path for- and exploring new passive components such as piezoelec-
ward. Hybrid switched-capacitor converters and, in general, trics for potential use in power conversion. Entirely new
multilevel converters follow the trend presented by several approaches to power conversion were also viewed favor-
panelists, where the designers judiciously leverage circuit ably, but likely best identified and pursued by the next gen-
complexity to obtain performance improvements. Key tech- eration of power electronics engineers.
nology drivers or successful implementations of such solu-
tions are digital control, integration, and improved active and About the Author
passive devices. Robert Pilawa-Podgurski (pilawa@berkeley.edu) received
Another challenge that was identified by many par- his B.S., M.Eng., and Ph.D. degrees from the Massachusetts
ticipants was that of research in packaging, integration, Institute of Technology, Cambridge. He is an associate profes-
and manufacturability. This area was viewed by many as sor in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences
critical for performance improvements, yet difficult for Department at the University of California, Berkeley.
many university research groups to participate in. There Previously, he was an associate professor in electrical and
is a concern that only the most well-connected research computer engineering at the University of Illinois, Urbana-
groups and largest companies have the scale to be at Champaign. He received the IEEE Power Electronics Society
the forefront of technology development in this area. In Richard M. Bass Outstanding Young Power Electronics Engi-
addition to the importance of new design tools suitable neer Award, in 2014, and the IEEE Education Society Mac E.
for academic research, there may be a need for shared/ Van Valkenburg Award for outstanding contributions to
pooled resources, similar to what is done in CMOS inte- teaching unusually early in one’s career, in 2018. He is a coau-
grated circuits. Standard process design kits and foundry thor of nine IEEE prize-winning papers.
approaches have served the integrated circuit community
well, and may well be on a path worth pursuing for power Reference
integration as well. [1] A. J. Hanson, J. A. Belk, S. Lim, C. R. Sullivan, and D. J. Perreault, “Mea-
Finally, the participants agreed that for power electron- surements and performance factor comparisons of magnetic materials at
ics, form fits function, and a key opportunity is identifying high frequency,” IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 31, no. 11, pp. 7909–7925,
the right applications where dramatic system performance Nov. 2016. doi: 10.1109/TPEL.2015.2514084.

Energy Access
A new power electronics story
by Jelena Popovic
E
nergy access and the role of power electronics in energy efficiency. The past decade of experience strongly
it was a new topic at the 10th IEEE Future of suggests that energy access should not be seen as a silver
Electronic Power Processing and Conversion bullet in solving poverty but looked at through the
(FEPPCON X) workshop in Tromso, Norway. The broader, cross-sector lens of development, including food
session was chaired by Prof. Deepak Divan of the security, access to water, health care, and economic and
Georgia Institute of Technology, and speakers Matt Jordan, institutional development.
Pedro Rodriguez, Jinjun Liu, and Jelena
Popovic gave their perspectives on the The End of the Road for
power electronics-related and broader Technology Innovation
aspects of energy access, kicking off a
PELS should establish in Energy Access?
lively panel discussion. its role as a key techni- There is a popular notion in the
broader energy access community
cal partner in the
Energy Poverty Versus Poverty? that achieving energy access is no
As of 2019, close to a billion people global energy access longer a question of technology.
worldwide live without electricity community, leading The technology, the argument goes,
access, and another 2 billion have is already there, and it is now down
unreliable access. The strong histori- the conversation to sufficient investments, effective
cal correlation between countries’ about identifying R&D policies, and the invisible hand to
electricity consumption and human provide electricity to the billion
development (Figure 1) has driven challenges for trans- people currently without energy
energy access policies and invest- formative electricity access. A critical look at the experi-
ments in past decades. A couple of ence with the existing approaches
interesting observations can be made. access and contribut- and their (mis)match to users’
The biggest gain appears to be in the ing to developing and needs leads us to argue that tech-
first few hundred kilowatt hours of nology innovation still has an
the consumption, illustrating the
managing standards important role to play. The grid
importance of electricity access for in the context of fast- extension efforts face low con-
developing countries in improving the sumption levels—as a typical exam-
moving technologies.
well-being of their citizens. Further- ple, more than half of all customers
more, the outliers (energy-efficient serviced by the Kenyan utility use
countries above and resource-rich less than 15 kWh/month. As a
countries below the trend line) suggest that it is the con- result, utilities are unable to recover their costs—only
sumption of electricity services rather than electricity two African utilities are not running at a loss. The cost of
itself that correlates with the human development index grid connection is prohibitively high in some countries,
(HDI), which, combined with the global climate chal- resulting in unconnected households, even in close prox-
lenges, makes a case for the further need for increasing imity to the grid infrastructure (Figure 2). Microgrids suf-
fer from the demand problem, too; most deployed
microgrids are underutilized, putting pressure on the
business model and creating financing risk, which, com-
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 bined with other factors, such as community integration

and operational issues in some con- cost reduction, knowledge transfer,
texts, makes long-term sustainabil- and creation of local economic oppor-
ity questionable. Solar home systems, PELS should promote tunities. The Solar Urja through Local-
off-grid single household solutions ization for Sustainability initiative of
consisting of a small photovoltaic and engage with ener- the Indian Institute of Technology
panel, battery storage with power gy access as a research Bombay, the grand winner of the IEEE
electronics, and dc loads have dem- Power Electronics Society (PELS)
onstrated increasing market adop-
and education topic. Empower a Billion Lives (EBL) chal-
tion but are still too expensive for lenge, is a noteworthy pioneer in this
the majority of unelectrified homes direction, using open source design,
and are unable to power larger, pro- local assembly and manufacturing, and
ductive energy loads. The latter could be the contributing local capacity building to enable basic energy access for mil-
factor to the failure to demonstrate the off-grid solar lions of households, income generation through local entre-
industry promise of the climb up the energy ladder by off- preneurship, and women’s empowerment.
grid households. New generations of students and researchers are in-
There is room for fresh thinking and new approaches creasingly seeking to be engaged in more than excellent
that are a better match to users’ needs: lowering cost science. If the fledgling experience of the power electronics
at a higher reliability and availability of
supply, flexibility in accommodating vari-
ous loads and sources, enabling growth 1
through modularity and interconnectivity, Germany United States
0.9
Well-Being (HDI Score)
ultrahigh efficiency appliances for con- Canada Norway

sumptive and productive energy use, and 0.8 Brazil Kuwait
Saudi Arabia
enabling new local economic and social Russian Federation
0.7 China
opportunities. It is an opportunity to build
South Africa
a new kind of power system: decentral- 0.6
Ghana
ized, bottom up, and context appropriate, Kenya
0.5 Nigeria
with power electronics as the key en -
Senegal
abling technology. 0.4 Ethiopia
0.3 DRC
New Ways and New Generations 0 5,000 10,000 15,000 20,000 25,000
For long-term sustainability of any energy Average Electricity Consumption (kWh/capita/Year)
access solution, it is crucial that the solu-
tion be designed, deployed, and maintained,
FIG 1 The human development index (HDI) score versus average electricity con-
taking into account the social, economic,
sumption. (Source: World Bank, UN HDI; adapted by Matt Jordan.)
and cultural context lest it be yet another
case of the developed world pushing solu-
tions it has and knows how to make without
knowing what users really want and need.
This calls for going far beyond “having a
social scientist in the room” and a new,
transdisciplinary approach to R&D toward
creating appropriate technologies that are
integrated into a sustainable sociotechnical
system to create a positive and lasting
impact. Collaborative interdisciplinary
research in research institutions and with
local partners well embedded in target com-
munities is essential for testing research
hypotheses and ensuring that, beyond excel-
lent engineering science contributions, our
research creates a positive and lasting
impact. Technologies and solutions that
embed and enable alternative innovation FIG 2 A rural household in Uttar Pradesh, India, not connected to the grid
models, such as cocreation, localization, and despite the grid lines passing the house for decades. (Source: Gaurav Manchanda;
open source, may enable faster adoption, used with permission.)

groups active in energy access is any- should promote and engage with
thing to go by, there is a huge interest energy access as a research and edu-
and motivation among students and
If the fledgling experi- cation topic through creating publi-
young professionals to engage with the ence of the power cation pathways, supporting trans-
field of energy access. This enthusiasm disciplinary curriculum development,
electronics groups
should be nourished and engagement and attracting and engaging students,
enabled through coursework, service active in energy access scholars, industry professionals, and
learning, collaborative platforms, and is anything to go by, volunteers passionate about energy
other means so that the graduates leav- access. Additionally, creating new
ing our lecture halls and labs use their there is a huge interest local partnerships and building on
knowledge and potential to contribute and motivation existing ones is essential for ensuring
to solving the biggest societal chal- local relevance and appropriateness,
lenges of our time. among students and enabling capacity development and
young professionals to technology transfer.
Increasing PELS Engagement Energy access is a worthy chal-
in Energy Access engage with the field lenge and big opportunity for the
The first round of EBL—a PELS of energy access. power electronics community as
energy access initiative and global a whole. It is an exciting technical
challenge for unleashing innovation challenge of building a whole new
for regionally relevant, holistic, scal- grid, one that is context appropriate
able, and economically viable solutions for solving energy and environmentally friendly. It is an opportunity to tell a
poverty—ran over the course of 2018–2019. The competi- new power electronics story of the technology that truly
tion attracted 475 teams from 70 countries, innovating (em)powers a sustainable future for all of humanity.
across technology solutions, business models, and ways
of creating social impact. Through this ambitious initia- About the Author
tive, PELS has created a network in the broader energy Jelena Popovic (j.popovic@utwente.nl) received her Dipl.
access community, including development organizations, Ing. degree from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Uni-
private sector, foundations, and other relevant stakehold- versity of Belgrade, Serbia, in 2001 and her Ph.D. degree
ers. After having completed the first round, it is the right from the Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands, in
time to reflect on how PELS can build on EBL to further 2005. She is with the University of Twente, Enschede, The
engage with energy access and ensure both initiative sus- Netherlands, as a part-time associate professor to develop an
tainability and a meaningful contribution to the energy energy access program. From 2005 to 2011, she was with the
access challenge. The engagement should be multifaceted European Center for Power Electronics as a technology trans-
and directed both outward and inward. A governance fer coordinator. From 2008 to 2017, she was with the Delft
mechanism and funding strategy for EBL should be estab- University of Technology as an assistant professor. In 2018,
lished to ensure sustainability. PELS should establish its she cofounded a start-up in energy access, Klimop Energy. She
role as a key technical partner in the global energy access has published more than 80 publications in scientific journals,
community, leading the conversation about identifying magazines, and conferences. Her research interests are bot-
R&D challenges for transformative electricity access and tom-up solutions for energy access, appropriate technology,
contributing to developing and managing standards in the and sociotechnical integration.
context of fast-moving technologies. Furthermore, PELS

Space Mapping for
Codesigned Magnetics
Optimization techniques for high-fidelity
multidomain design specifications
by Kristen Booth and John Bandler
©ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/FORYOU13
B
reaking through the current power density, efficiency, and cost ceilings is
no small feat. With converter designs that reach well beyond 20 kW/L and
>99% efficiency, it is no wonder that design optimization has filtered into
power electronics to further push these envelopes.
Throughout the design methodology and hardware build, it is imperative
that we consider the effects of the design in multiple domains, for example, thermal, struc-
tural, and electrical, at each stage of the process. To this aim, a mixture of design possibili-
ties and methodologies are available. However, the few designs that are tested in hardware
still have inconsistencies when compared with the optimized analytical results. This can
stem from model limitations or product tolerances used in the hardware. With this in mind,
it is an easy step to consider an optimization procedure between the mathematical models
and the experimental test setup.
For this article, we will expose the reader to two techniques that can be used to achieve
more advanced designs: codesign and space mapping. By integrating the two techniques,
an example of a higher-frequency transformer design is compared with the experimental
results. Accordingly, it is shown that only with the combination of the two techniques can
the design be physically implemented to be within the multidomain constraints of the opti-
mization procedure.


Codesign expertise—became generically known as the engineer’s
Codesign is far more than a method of designing an electri- feel for a problem.
cal circuit, optimized or otherwise, and going through the We can call such expertise-driven models low-fidelity
motions of double-checking that the topology will maintain or coarse models. Coarse, but physically meaningful mod-
decent thermal conditions due to losses, ease of mainte- els, were good enough for practical purposes before the
nance, or vibration requirements. It is also not so simple as formal exploitation of mathematically based optimization
determining a model for each domain and iteratively run- algorithms. And they still are!
ning through each model until a desired outcome for all Coarse models remain essential to the engineer’s under-
considerations is created. No, codesign requires a thought- standing of their specialized fields (such as equivalent cir-
ful process of integrating each domain to succeed in the cuits in electrical engineering) as well as to meeting the
overall design of the system. mounting challenges of approaching
Using transformer design as an a desired optimal design employ-
example of this process, let’s consider Only with the combi- ing highly accurate, computation-
the potential domains. The electri- ally intensive, physically based, or
cal requirements are the primary to nation of the two electromagnetically based simulators.
secondary voltage and current ratio. techniques can the Computationally intensive but highly
When implemented in a nonideal set- accurate simulators or devices under
ting, leakage inductance, magnetizing design be physically test can also be called high-fidelity or
inductance, and parasitic capacitances implemented to be fine models.
occur. These parasitic capacitances The question is: how can we make
stem from the physical implementa-
within the multido- intelligent, effective use of both coarse
tion of the transformer itself. For exam- main constraints of and fine models in the same problem? The
ple, factors that affect them are core answer should not come as a shock
structure, number of turns and corre-
the optimization to anyone, because we all effectively
sponding layers, and the physical loca- procedure. iterate between coarse and fine mod-
tion of the primary winding in relation els in our everyday lives, whether we
to the secondary winding. Proximity know it or not. But it did. The simple
losses are also of concern, which can create more heat than answer shocked engineers when Bandler first announced
expected and impact the thermal estimations of the origi- the space mapping concept in the early 1990s [1], and even
nal design. decades later, some engineers and mathematicians are
In summary, transformer design ultimately needs to still amazed.
happen in the physical realm. While many models account Space mapping is common sense in action. We go back
for the physical structure and have high accuracy, they can and forth between our coarse and fine models. We try our
be seen as too complex when viewed from a system level best with our coarse model, and we see what our corre-
of design, where the transformer is just one of many com- sponding fine model produces. If unsatisfactory, we recali-
ponents to be integrated. However, codesign falls short brate our coarse model and try again. We don’t abandon our
when used in an optimization procedure. This is due to the coarse model. Instead, we evaluate and update a “mapping”
sequential nature of the coding algorithm. In this way, engi- between our two models and try again.
neers are forced to select a code layout where an outcome Let’s return to the early engineers who designed and
of one model is inserted into another domain’s model. This built workable, highly complex electrical devices and struc-
limits the impact of this sequential design procedure unless tures before the advent of electronic computers. They iter-
it can be corrected. Enter space mapping. ated intelligently between their fast-to-evaluate but highly
effective coarse model and their expensive-to-realize fine
Space Mapping model, that is, a prototype or device under test.
So, what is space mapping? First, we have to agree on some Intuitively, they used space mapping. Its astonishingly
engineering fundamentals. simple formulation was first published in 1994 [1], followed
How did engineers design and build workable, highly by Aggressive Space Mapping (ASM) in 1995 [2]. Space
complex electrical devices and structures before the mapping asks us to compute a simple mathematical map-
advent of electronic computers, let alone today’s high- ping between corresponding coarse and fine models. What
speed computers? Of course, they used models: mental distinguishes different algorithms is how this mapping is
models and/or mental models augmented, for example, calculated or improved—explicitly or implicitly—either
by paper-and-pencil calculations and/or experimen- before or during the design optimization process.
tal prototypes. These models were perfected by their
common sense or augmented by years of specialized ASM Methodology
study and experience, by data sheets and other means. Preferably using all available prior iterations of the algo-
The fruits of this experience and know-how—their rithm, the aim of ASM is to predict a set of fine-model

design variable values such that the fine-model respon-
ses match already satisfactory (target) coarse-model opti-
mal responses.
The following procedure is adapted from Bandler [3]: 15
Core Loss (W)

First Iteration 10
Optimize your (fast) coarse model until your specifi-
5
cations are optimally satisfied.
Assign the resulting (original coarse model) opti-
0
mal design values to the fine model. 12
2
10 200
Evaluate your (expensive) fine model. 160
180
If the design specifications are met, indicating 8 140
mber of
Number 120
Turns 6 100 S i hi
Switching
that your coarse and fine models are sufficiently Frequency (kHz)
aligned, STOP.
Initialize to the identity matrix an assumed map- FIG 1 The higher-frequency transformer losses in analytical
ping matrix, B, between corresponding design vari- model (surface) and finite-element analysis tool (discrete
ables in the two spaces. points).
Second and Subsequent Iterations method typically used in transformer optimization. The
BEGIN: Expedite parameter extraction. This is an chosen optimized design point is then directly assigned to
optimization process to determine the shift in coarse- the fine model.
model design variables (with respect to the original In this example, the fine model is the experimental setup.
optimal coarse-model design values) necessary to best The difference between the fine- and coarse-model outcomes
match (align) the coarse model with the fine model. is then minimized using parameter extraction (using suit-
The uniqueness of the parameter extraction process able techniques), and a new design point is found. As already
is essential. indicated, this process repeats until the difference between
Use B to determine the linear shift in fine-model the original coarse-model outcome and the latest fine-model
design variables based on the shift in coarse-model design is within a specified tolerance. This codesign–ASM
variables found by parameter extraction. process aids us in better matching our coarse model with our
Update B using the well-known Broyden formula experimental results in all physical domains.
[2], [4]. NOTE: retaining B as the identity matrix is ASM incorporates knowledge from both a computation-
simple and can be effective, but it neglects informa- ally efficient, less accurate (coarse) model and a slower,
tion from previous iterations. higher accuracy (fine) model. The fundamental idea behind
Use the shift in variables to assign new design val- using two models is due to the apparent misalignment in
ues to the fine model. the performance space surfaces. For example, Figure 1
Evaluate the fine model. shows the performance space of an analytical model and 3D
If the specifications are met (implying that your finite-element analysis for losses in a higher-frequency trans-
currently mapped coarse model and fine models are former. The design space maintains a constant core volume
sufficiently aligned), STOP. and ranges of switching frequency and number of turns. We
If a specified number of iterations (or other stop- see that the surface and discrete points have similar con-
ping criteria) are reached, STOP. tours with some nonlinear offsets across the space. ASM
Go to BEGIN. facilitates the alignment between the two spaces to realize
the best performance in the fine model space with fewer
The uniqueness of the parameter extraction process is expensive iterations.
essential to ensuring a one-to-one, invertible mapping that
faithfully (re)aligns the coarse and fine models over local Optimizing a Higher-Frequency Transformer
excursions of the design variables. In transformer design, there are two main design consider-
The process can fail (intuition often fails); remedies are ations—leakage inductance and power density—which con-
discussed in the literature [5]. You may, for example, con- strain transformer implementation when used within dc/dc
sider the powerful methodology known as implicit space converter systems. These design considerations are the driv-
mapping [5] to improve the accuracy of the coarse model. ing forces behind transformer optimization algorithms. For
example, a tuned leakage inductance enables soft switching
Preparing the Problem for many converters using resonant tanks and can aid in
ASM is simple to incorporate into existing optimization power transfer. Therefore, the motivation for designing a
procedures. The first step is to optimize the coarse (ana- transformer from the leakage inductance requirements is
lytical) model using a current state-of-the-art (SOA) readily apparent [6], [7]. The power density of the transformer

can drastically affect the efficiency of requirements on the other hand are
the system since transformer losses given a lower priority. Consequently,
can be 30% or more of the total system
Space mapping asks discrepancies—not surprisingly—
losses, especially when using wide- us to compute a sim- appear between the simulated model
bandgap semiconductor devices. and the experimental results. There-
ple mathematical
For the coarse model, an evolution- fore, a team at North Carolina State
ary optimization algorithm, Natural mapping between cor- University has investigated a method
Selection Genetic Algorithm-II, is used. responding coarse and to optimize higher-frequency trans-
This procedure requires maximizing a formers that results in an experimen-
fitness function, in this case the sum- fine models. tal design that is accurately predicted
mation power density and efficiency, by thermal and loss models using
subject to constraints: flux density ASM [8]. While ASM has also been
and specific temperatures of the trans- used in the higher-frequency trans-
former. The transformer can be designed with variations in former optimization process by other research teams, the
the design variables (number of cores, frequency, and pri- design variables incorporated do not enable a physically
mary turns). Each of these has limits that were created by realizable transformer design [9], [10]. This relegates these
size constraints, saturation flux density, and window area of works to remain useful but theoretical.
the selected core. E-cores, with a fixed set of dimensions, are To bridge the gap between our analytical model and
used to create a shell-type structure. experimental setting, a hard-switched single active
While the range of leakage inductance has been the bridge scaled-down 3.5-kW converter is used as an ex-
leading design constraint in transformer optimization ample to demonstrate this optimization procedure for
for power electronic converters, power density is defined higher-frequency transformers. Our coarse model was
as an objective in the optimization process. Thermal designed using the MATLAB Optimization Toolbox.
The fine model for this case is the experimental setup
to further reduce differences in the final design and the
Table 1. The 3.5-kW design specifications. desired outcomes. The design specifications are given in
Parameter Rating or Range Table 1. A standard E-core size is stacked to achieve the
Design Input voltage 450 V appropriate flux density.
specifications The initial coarse-model optimization is shown in Figure 2.
Turns ratio 1:1
The chosen optimized design point is a transformer with
Rated power 3.5 kW
Design variables Number of cores 1–10
Number of turns 2–24
Switching frequency 25–200 kHz
Feasible Designs
99.65 Diode Bridge
Nominal Design
Output to Load
99.6 SOA Result
ASM Result
99.55
Efficiency (%)
99.5
99.45
99.4
DUT
99.35
Full Bridge
99.3
3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Power Density (kW/L)
DSP
FIG 2 The performance space of higher-frequency transformer
optimization (circles). The chosen design (square), experimen-
tal results of the SOA (star), and ASM (hexagram) methods are FIG 3 An experimental setup for full load test of the device under
shown for comparison. test [8]. DUT: device under test; DSP: digital signal processor.

Table 2. A comparison of optimization model and the experimental results.
Analytical Model SOA Design ASM Design
Design Number of cores 3 3 3
variables
Number of turns 10 10 11
Switching frequency (kHz) 187.5 187.5 180.5
Losses (W) Core losses 5.26 7.4 5.8
Primary losses 3.86 3.8 4.8
Secondary losses 4.17 4.3 5.7
Total losses 13.29 15.5 16.3
Nodal (1) Center limb 85 97.5 84.4
temperatures (°C)
(2) Upper yoke 64.5 84.4 72.5
(3) Outer limb 62 69.8 57.8
(4) Lower yoke 76.2 76.5 66.6
(5) Primary 121.7 115 115
(6) Secondary 118.8 108 109
The values in red highlight the mismatch in core losses (7.4–5.26 W), which corresponds to a higher than expected steady-state maximum core temperature (97.5 °C).
The values in green highlight the model fidelity gained by using ASM, facilitating the codesign optimization process.
three cores, 10 turns, and 187.5 kHz. This design was

tested in the experimental setup shown in Figure 3, until
the steady-state temperature was attained. The results
indicate higher core losses than predicted, resulting in
an underestimation of steady-state temperatures. The Upper Yoke 2
current SOA method for higher-frequency transformer
optimization yields an experimental result indicated by
Center Limb
Outer Limb
the red star in Figure 2. Due to the misalignment between

Secondary
Primary
the coarse model and the experiment, the transformer
is almost 15 °C hotter than expected, which pushes the
boundary of the thermal constraint of 100 °C for the mag-
netic material. 3 6 5 1
Using the current experimental result, the design space
of the coarse model is swept to expedite the parameter
extraction process of ASM. This allows us to shift to the
new design point. Our design has three cores, 11 turns, and
180.4 kHz. The number of turns has increased by one and
the switching frequency has been reduced by 7 kHz. Follow-
ing the same experimental procedure as before, the ASM Lower Yoke 4
design point is experimentally tested. The results show that
the steady-state temperature is reduced to the predicted
temperature conditions. See the pink hexagram in Figure 2.
Note the tradeoff in predicting steady-state temperature FIG 4 The nodal temperature locations on the higher-fre-
and transformer efficiency, due in part to the simplified, quency transformer [11]. The numbers in this figure corre-
analytical model used to create the initial design (green spond to the nodal temperatures in Table 2.
square in Figure 2).
Table 2 gives a full comparison of the designs with Conclusions
nodal temperatures defined in Figure 4. Our improved Analytical optimization isn’t always quite good enough. To
optimization procedure provides better-designed compo- achieve an integrated codesign for this physical higher-
nents and the potential to further understand the design frequency transformer, we turned to aggressive space map-
limitations. Our codesign ASM result may not appear ping. This adjustment enabled the design to fit electrical and
better in the electrical realm, but it accounts for the ther- mechanical constraints. There is always a tradeoff. To gain
mal design. better thermal performance, the losses in the transformer

Our improved optimi-
zation procedure pro-
vides better-designed
components and the
potential to further
understand the design
limitations.
were shifted to the windings and increased due to an addi- References

tional turn. Does this make it a better transformer in com- [1] J. W. Bandler, R. M. Biernacki, S. H. Chen, P. A. Grobelny, and R. H. Hem-
parison? Maybe not. But it does make it a better-modeled mers, “Space mapping technique for electromagnetic optimization,” IEEE
transformer in that all domains are equally treated by opti- Trans. Microw. Theory Techn., vol. 42, no. 12, pp. 2536–2544, Dec. 1994. doi:
mization and, ultimately, optimally codesigned. 10.1109/22.339794.
[2] J. W. Bandler, R. M. Biernacki, S. H. Chen, R. H. Hemmers, and K. Madsen,
Acknowledgments “Electromagnetic optimization exploiting aggressive space mapping,” IEEE
This material is based on work supported by the National Trans. Microw. Theory Techn., vol. 43, no. 12, pp. 2874–2882, Dec. 1995. doi:
Science Foundation under grant DGE-1252376. Kristen 10.1109/22.475649.
Booth’s results were obtained with help from Harish Subra- [3] J. W. Bandler, “Space mapping—have you ever wondered about the engi-
manyan at the FREEDM Systems Center under the direction neer’s mysterious ‘feel’ for a problem? [Speaker’s Corner],” IEEE Microw. Mag.,
of Srdjan Lukic. John Bandler’s contribution is supported in vol. 19, no. 2, pp. 112–122, Mar.–Apr. 2018. doi: 10.1109/MMM.2017.2780722.
part by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research [4] J. E. Rayas-Sanchez, “Power in simplicity with ASM: Tracing the aggressive
Council of Canada and Bandler Corporation. space mapping algorithm over two decades of development,” IEEE Microw.
Mag., vol. 17, no. 4, pp. 64–76, Apr. 2016. doi: 10.1109/MMM.2015.2514188.
About the Authors [5] J. W. Bandler et al., “Space mapping: The state of the art,” IEEE Trans.
Kristen Booth (booth.335@osu.edu) received her B.S.E. Microw. Theory Techn., vol. 52, no. 1, pp. 337–361, Jan. 2004. doi: 10.1109/
degree from Murray State University, Kentucky, in 2015 and TMTT.2003.820904.
her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from North Carolina State Uni- [6] M. A. Bahmani, T. Thiringer, and M. Kharezy, “Design methodology and
versity, Raleigh, in 2017 and 2019, respectively. She is a post- optimization of a medium frequency transformer for high power DC-DC
doctoral researcher in the Center for High Performance applications,” in Proc. 2015 IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conf. and
Power Electronics at The Ohio State University, Columbus. Exposition (APEC), pp. 2532–2539. doi: 10.1109/APEC.2015.7104707.
Her research interests include resiliency and reliability of [7] M. Mogorovic and D. Dujic, “100kW, 10kHz medium frequency transform-
power electronics converters, artificial intelligence-integrat- er design optimization and experimental verification,” IEEE Trans. Power
ed power electronics, optimization of medium frequency Electron., vol. 34, no. 2, pp. 1696–1708, 2019. doi: 10.1109/TPEL.2018.2835564.
transformers, and power electronics for grid modernization. [8] K. Booth, “Multidomain medium frequency transformer optimization
She is a Member of the IEEE. using high fidelity modelling,” Ph.D. dissertation, North Carolina State Univ.,
John Bandler (bandler@mcmaster.ca) studied at the Raleigh, 2019.
Imperial College of Science and Technology, London, and [9] T.-V. Tran, S. Brisset, D. Echeverria, D. J. P. Lahaye, and P. Brochet,
received his B.Sc. (Eng.), Ph.D., and D.Sc. (Eng.) degrees “Space-mapping techniques applied to the optimization of a safety isolating
from the University of London in 1963, 1967, and 1976, transformer,” CWI, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, MAS-E0714, 2007.
respectively. He is a professor emeritus and Officer of the [10] S. Candolfi, P. Viarouge, D. Aguglia, and J. Cros, “Hybrid design optimi-
Order of Canada. He has published more than 500 technical zation of high voltage pulse transformers for Klystron modulators,” IEEE
papers and contributions to books, won many professional Trans. Dielectr. Electr. Insul., vol. 22, no. 6, pp. 3617–3624, Dec. 2015. doi:
awards, and pioneered the space mapping technology in 10.1109/TDEI.2015.005047.
1993. He has been honored by a Queen Elizabeth II [11] K. Booth, H. Subramanyan, X. Liang, J. Liu, S. Srdic, and S. Lukic, “Opti-
Diamond Jubilee Medal and won the 2018 Gold Medal from mization of medium frequency transformer with practical considerations,”
Professional Engineers Ontario. He is a Life Fellow of the in Proc. IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conf. and Exposition (APEC),
IEEE, a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and a fellow Anaheim, CA, 2019, pp. 2906–2911. doi: 10.1109/APEC.2019.8722164.
of the Canadian Academy of Engineering.

by Stefan Milovanovic and Drazen Dujic
T
he modular multilevel converter (MMC) pre- With power being the product of voltage and current, it
sented in Figure 1 found its place within high- might seem that unlimited power ratings can be achieved
voltage and medium-voltage (MV) applica- by increasing the rated voltage of an MMC through the
tions owing to the possibility of effortlessly installation of a higher number of SMs into its branches.
meeting the imposed voltage requirements by However, such a claim is only partially correct. Namely,
stacking the so-called submodules (SMs) in a series [1]. the applications in which the voltage can be freely selected
Therefore, high-quality voltage waveforms can be syn- exist and, in these cases, high power ratings (e.g., 500 MW)
thesized across the MMC ac terminals, while using the are indeed achieved by relying on the aforementioned
power devices of a lower voltage rating, resulting in a principle. Typical examples refer to the high-voltage power
very modest or even no filtering requirement on the grid transmission, in which several hundred megawatts are
side. Depending on the application, the SMs are mainly transferred across the power lines operating at several
half bridge (HB) or full bridge (FB), not including the hundreds of kilovolts. On the other hand, the use of an
other types of SMs reported in the literature [2]. Accord- MMC has also been investigated in the applications, such
ing to Figure 1, a cluster of SMs in a series connection as the MV drives [3], where the operating voltages are well
with an inductor L br will be referred to as the branch, defined (e.g., 3.3-, 6-, and 11-kV drives). With the standard-
whereas two branches comprise the leg. ized application voltages, an increase in the MMC power
©ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/-STRIHZ-
On Power
Scalability of
Increasing
current ratings
Modular Multilevel
through branch
paralleling Converters

rating implies its current capacity boost, which may not
idc
always be trivial to accomplish.
Let one observe an exemplary case with the MMC being
connected to a 10-kV dc network while employing the SMs
designed to withstand the voltage and current equal to 1 kV
and 1 kA, respectively. This SM design will be referred to as
Lbr the available design (AD), while 10 kV represents the nor-
malization basis regarding the converter dc voltage.
Vdc
In the analyzed case and using simplified calcula-
tion, the number of SMs per branch can be determined as
N = 10 kV/1 kV = 10. In the power-voltage (P-V) diagram
from Figure 2, such an operating point was labeled with
the yellow star [v ) = 1 per unit (p.u.) and p ) = 1 p.u.]. If, for
example, five SMs are added into every branch of the ana-
isA SM isB Branch isC Leg lyzed MMC, the voltage it can interface at its dc terminals
A B C increases to 15 kV ^v ) = 1.5 p.u. h . As the SM current rating
(a) is unchanged, the rated power of the converter gets scaled
linearly. In other words, changing the number of series-con-
nected SMs within a branch causes the converter operating
point (OP) to slide along the green line in Figure 2. Hence,
+
the point OP 1 indicates an increased number of series-con-
nected SMs ^ N = 15 h with respect to the converter operat-
vbr
vbr
ing at voltage equal to 1 p.u. ^ N = 10 h, yet with the same
current rating.
However, to meet the requirements of any application
with an OP residing above the green line, the current han-
Lbr Lbr
dling capabilities of the converter must be increased. If
(b) an application operates at the OP 2 (15 kV, 1.5 kA), reusing
the available SMs is not possible owing to the current rat-
FIG 1 (a) An MMC. (b) As every branch provides the possibility
ing insufficiency, even if the application’s voltage require-
for high-quality voltage generation, it can be modeled with an
ideal voltage source. ments are met. A new SM could be designed to meet the
application needs; however, this comes with an additional
research and development cost. Providing that a new SM
M with twice the initial current rating is available, the newly
designed system ratings allow OP 3 to be reached. How-
OP4 i∗ 2i ∗ 3i ∗ ever, the system operating voltage remains unchanged, as
indicated in Figure 2.
Power (p.u.)
3
OP3 While the OP 2 can be served now, the actual MMC has
2 OP2 significantly higher ratings than required and is likely to
OP1 be more expensive than needed. A further increase of the
1 AD
OP5 SM current rating (e.g., three times the initial current) gives
0 another capability line in the P-V plane and provides insight
0 0.5 1 1.5 N
Voltage (p.u.)
into the MMC scalability. It is noteworthy that reaching the
power-scaling plot corner points (e.g., OP 4: high power−
Legend low voltage or OP 5: low power−high voltage) would likely
AD 10 × {1 kV/1 kA} not be reasonable economy-wise or practical in engineer-
OP1 15 × {1 kV/1 kA} ing terms. In other words, despite many advantages, the
OP2 Unfeasible MMC has its own limitations regarding the span of OPs that
OP3 15 × {1 kV/2 kA} can be served with satisfactory economic and technical
efficiency. Moreover, the current, and simultaneously the
FIG 2 The MMC power scalability depending on the available SM power, capacity boost is rather a nontrivial task with sev-
design. The availability of an SM with rated voltage and current eral technical challenges as described next.
equal to 1 kV and 1 kA was assumed, whereas the normalization
basis for the operating voltage of an observed converter was
adopted as 10 kV. As the OP2 cannot be reached unless additional MMC Scalability Options
modifications of the SMs are performed, it was characterized as The parallel connection of power modules (PMs), as shown
the unfeasible operating point (concerning the existing SM design). in Figure 3(a), is widely used for monolithic converters such

as the neutral point clamped, flying employed in all MMC-alike circuits
capacitor, cascaded H-bridge con- (e.g., matrix MMC, Δ-STATCOM, and
verter, and so on. It can also be used
Despite many advan- so on).
for the MMC, providing that consider- tages, the MMC has its In this case, the existing SMs can
ations on different static and dynamic be reused without the need to undergo
own limitations
characteristics of the employed mod- any major redesign process and power
ules [4], [5] are considered. However, regarding the span of scaling of the MMC gets substantial-
if a single SM design is to serve an OPs that can be served ly facilitated, yet with the constraints
application with several current rat- are imposed solely by the employed
ings (e.g., 100 A, 200 A, and 300 A), with satisfactory eco- control platform. To retain the naming
the cooling system, as well as the nomic and technical consistency, what has been referred to
overall form factor, are likely deter- as the branch so far, will henceforth
mined for the highest of considered efficiency. be referred to as the subbranch (SBR).
currents. More importantly, parallel- However, the following two challenges
ing of the PMs implies a higher SM must be addressed:
capacitance, and implicitly the volumetric requirements, ■■equal current sharing among the SBRs
since the SM energy oscillations increase proportionally to ■■equal energy distribution among the SBRs.
its current rating [6].
Figure 3(b) illustrates the extension of the MMC cur- Modeling and Control of the MMC Operating
rent capacity through the paralleling of HB (or FB) SMs [7]. With Parallel SBRs
There are few downsides to this approach: 1) positive ter- Figure 4 presents the MMC operating in this configuration.
minals of the SM capacitors should also be connected, with The number of series-connected SMs within an SBR is
the aim of equalizing the voltage across all of the SMs and, denoted by N, whereas M denotes the number of parallel
as a result, an additional terminal(s) must be provided; SBRs within a branch.
2) small, nevertheless, additional inductances L v must be Adopting the modeling approach illustrated in Fig-
installed in a series with every SM considering its voltage ure 1(b) provides the framework for the modeling of a
source nature; and 3) since paralleled SMs are normally branch of the MMC depicted in Figure 4(a)–(c). As illus-
switched on/off simultaneously, the synchronization among trated in Figure 5(a) and (b), a set of parallel SBRs can
the gate signals, or specially designed driver master/slave be replaced with an equivalent voltage source, in a series
structure, must also be provided. Figure 3(c) presents an connection with an equivalent impedance. As a result,
obvious choice of an arbitrary number of converters oper- the equivalent circuit of an MMC operating with parallel
ating in parallel, which is a well-known and widely used branches does not differ from the equivalent circuit of a
power-increase method; hence, it is not discussed further conventional MMC, as indicated in Figure 5(c). Conse-
in this article. quently, identical principles of the terminal currents con-
The previously presented MMC power-extension options trol [9] are retained.
can be considered to be state of the art. Interestingly, Given that simultaneous control of both dc and ac termi-
the existing literature does not consider another power- nal currents needs to be established, every branch produces
extension option, which alleviates many of the mentioned the voltage consisting of two components, as illustrated in
problems while providing certain advantages. Namely, Figure 6. Voltage components labeled with v c" A/B/C ,R contrib-
the MMC current capacity increase can also be achieved ute to the control of the MMC dc current i dc . On the other
through the paralleling of the branches [8], as presented hand, voltage components v s" A/B/C ,R control the MMC ac
in Figure 3(d). Since the branch represents the topological currents i s" A/B/C , . Both v c" A/B/C , and v s" A/B/C , are provided by
feature specific to the MMC, the identical approach can be the so-called higher control layers.
Additional Terminal
PM1 PMM SMM Vdc MMC1
SM1 1
Grid/Drive
N
vSM Lσ vSM Lbr
MMCM
BranchM
(a) (b) (c) (d)
FIG 3 The parallel connection of (a) PMs within an SM, (b) SMs, (c) an arbitrary number of MMCs, and (d) the MMC branches.

To control the terminal currents, the higher control lay- Therefore, to establish the equal SBR current sharing,
ers provide each of the branches with voltage reference an SBR voltage should be realized as v br, i = v )br + Tv br, i,
labeled with v )br . Nevertheless, the reference v )br is gener- where Tv br,i denotes an individual SBR voltage deviation
ated through the joint action of M parallel connected SBRs, from the reference provided by the higher control lay-
as presented in Figure 5. Hence, there are M degrees of free- ers. However, establishing the equal SBR current sharing
dom regarding the realization of the component v )br . does not lead to the equal energy distribution among the
At first instance, let one assume that v br,i = v )br holds. SBRs. On the contrary, since v br, 1 ! v br, 2 ! g ! v br,M , while
Since a practical realization of the SBR impedances with- i br, 1 = i br, 2 = g = i br,M holds, the SBR powers differ from
out any deviations from the rated parameters (for instance, each other, causing the divergence in the SBR energies.
TZ br = ! 20%) cannot be avoided, passing the identical volt- From here, one can conclude that balancing the SBR cur-
age reference to all of the SBRs causes the unequal current, rents opposes the balancing of the SBR energies, which can
and consequently power, sharing among them. be graphically presented as in Figure 7.
idc
Lbr
SBR Branch
Vdc
isA isB isC
Leg
A B C
FIG 4 The MMC operating with parallel SBRs.
idc
br+ br+ + + +
ibr ibr vpA∑ vpB∑ vpC∑
+ M
Lbr
1
vbr,1 vbr,2 vbr,M vbr∑ =
M
∑ vbr,i
i Rbr
ibr,1 ibr,2 ibr,M vbr Vdc
Lbr,1 Lbr,2 Lbr,M Lbr = Lbr/M
Rbr,1 Rbr,2 Rbr,M Rbr = Rbr/M isA isB isC
+ + +
vnA∑ vnB∑ vnC∑
br– br–
(a) (b) (c)
FIG 5 Since every SBR generates a high-quality voltage, the modeling approach presented in Figure 1(b) can be relied upon.
According to Thevenin’s theorem, (a) a set of parallel SBRs can be represented by (b) the equivalent consisting of a voltage source
in series connection with an equivalent impedance. (c) Consequently, the model of an MMC operating with parallel SBRs does not
differ from the conventional MMC illustrated in Figure 1(a).

idc idc
(+) (+)
icA icB icC
2Rbr
+ + + Vdc
2Lbr
vcA∑ vcB∑ vcC∑ + + +
2 vcA∑ 2 vcB∑ 2 vcC∑
vsA∑ vsB∑ vsC∑
(–)
+ + +
Vdc = +
+ + + vsA∑
vsA∑ vsB∑ vsC∑ + isA
+ + + A
vcA∑ vcB∑ vcC∑ vsB∑
+ isB
Lbr B
Rbr vsC∑
+ isC
(–) C
isA isB isC Lbr/2 Rbr/2
A B C
FIG 6 The simultaneous control of terminal currents requires every branch of the analyzed MMC to synthesize the voltage com-
prising two components, labeled with v c"A/B/C ,R (the dc component) and v s"A/B/C ,R (the ac component). As can be seen on the right
side of the figure, two circuits, decoupled from each other, can be formed to identify the effect that each of the branch voltage
components has on the control of terminal currents.
However, equal energy distribution among the SBRs is

Power considered the utmost priority of every MMC-based circuit.
Current Sharing Yes No No Therefore, in the structures containing parallel SBRs, the
Voltage Sharing No Yes No energy balancing must be given priority over the balancing
Power Sharing No No Yes of currents. Since every SBR produces the dc voltage that is
Voltage Current approximately equal to the voltage of the dc grid the MMC
is connected to (Vdc), the SBR power can be expressed as
FIG 7 Tradeoffs in the current, power, and voltage sharing of
DC AC
+ TP br + TP br
< depends
<
the parallel SBRs set. If a certain side of the triangle is chosen, P br,i = P br
)
. (1)
equal sharing of the quantities positioned on the other two 1 on TZ br
2 Vdc T I br,i
sides of the triangle cannot be achieved. For instance, equal
current sharing requires the SBRs to generate different volt-
ages, causing unequal power sharing. Similar reasoning can be Therefore, balancing of the SBR powers (energies) can
applied to the other two cases. be ensured through the intentional generation of the SBR
M
br+ Identical Voltages br+
∗
Σ ∆vbr,i = 0 br+
ibr ibr = ibr i=1 ∆Ibr = 0!
+ + + + + + + + +
vbr,1 vbr,2 vbr,M ∗
vbr ∗
vbr ∗
vbr ∆vbr,1 ∆vbr,2 ∆vbr,M
= ibr,2 ibr,2 ibr,M + ∆Ibr,1 ∆Ibr,2 ∆Ibr,M

Lbr,1 Lbr,2 Lbr,M
Rbr,1 Rbr,2 Rbr,M
br– br– br–
FIG 8 Balancing the SBR energies can be done through the intentional unbalances generated in the SBR dc currents. Namely,
M voltage disturbances, the sum of which equals zero, result in M current components that sum to zero at the branch terminals
(the right-most circuit). Consequently, the energy distribution among the SBRs can be affected.

dc current unbalances, labeled with T I br,i . Nonetheless, the control of the MMC terminal currents since v br = v br )
(their
unbalances T I br, i must remain invisible from the terminals effect cannot be observed from the branch terminals), as
of an observed branch; otherwise, the control of the termi- one can see from the right-most circuit in Figure 8.
nal currents gets corrupted. If v br, i = v )br + Tv br, i holds, the To obtain the suitable set of the SBR dc current unbal-
equivalent voltage seen from the terminals of an observed ances (T I br,i), the controller depicted in Figure 9 can be used.
branch equals Namely, the mean energy of every SBR (from an analyzed
branch) is calculated, based on the SMs voltage measure-
1 M 1 M ) 1 M
v brR = M / v br, i = M / v br + M / Tv br, i . (2) ments, to set the individual SBR energy reference as the aver-
i=1 i=1 i=1
1442443 144 4244 43 age of all of the measured SBR energies. Thereafter, the SBR
v)
br must be equal to zero
energy deviations from the established reference are passed
As the equivalent circuit of a branch is linear, the super- to the SBR energy-balancing controller, denoted by H TW . The
position principle can be employed as depicted in Figure 8. output of this controller represents the SBR power compo-
According to (2), supported visually by Figure 5, if the sum nent denoted by TPdc in (1). Finally, the references T I )br,i are
of the SBR voltage disturbances / iM= 1 Tv br, i equals zero, the passed to the SBR current-balancing controller. Notice that,
voltage seen between the branch terminals corresponds unless the controller part highlighted in green is included,
to the reference provided by the higher control layers. To this controller ensures the equal SBR current sharing, mean-
put it differently, the SBR current/voltage unbalances, used ing that partial balancing of the SBR currents is always main-
for the internal branch energy balancing, do not affect the tained, guaranteeing safe operation of the converter.
It is noteworthy that the choice of the SBR
current-balancing controller depends on the
SBR Energy nature of the analyzed circuit. In the case
Balancing
the conventional 3PH-MMC is observed, the
[M ] balancing of currents comprising dc and ac
+ H∆W dc Intentional
WbrΣ,i AVG Σ ∆Pbr,i terms introduces the need for proportional
Unbalances
– (at least) along with the resonant control-
∗
2/Vdc
SBR Current ler parts. Considering that the SBR energy-
∗
∆Ibr,i
Balancing balancing controller deals with the average
energies, the conventional P (or PI) control-
+ ∆ibr,i [M ] ler can be used to achieve satisfactory per-
ibr,i AVG + Σ H∆I ∆vbr,i formance. Also, the use of other nonlinear
– control methods is possible, although this
strongly depends on the control designer as
well as the employed control platform.
FIG 9 The SBR energy-balancing controller must be superimposed to the SBR cur-
Finally, the control block diagram of the
rent-balancing controller to ensure equal energy distribution among the SBRs. structure depicted in Figure 4 can be pre-
AVG: average. sented as in Figure 10, from which one can
vgrid ∗ ∗
igrid vsΣ ∗
vbr vbr,i
Higher-Level Grid Current
Q∗ Σ Σ Modulation Switching
Control Control + + Signals
P∗ + +
∗ ∆vbr,i
vcΣ
{ABC} Horizontal
WnΣ Balancing
Total Branch SBR Energy
Energies Σ
{ABC} + Balancing
WpΣ Vertical +
Balancing
Σ Σ
{ABC} ibr,i
WbrΣ,i
Total Energy
Control
∗
Vdc Individual
SBR Energies
Higher Control Layers
FIG 10 The control layers of the MMC operating with parallel SBRs.

Table 1. The parameters of the simulated
1 converters.
P ∗(p.u.)
0
SBR Energy Simulation 1 Simulation 2
Balancing Off
–1 Rated power (P ) )
1 MW 1.5 MW
0.28
Input voltage (Vdc ) 5 kV 5 kV
Q ∗(p.u.)
0 Number of SMs per SBR (N) 5 5

–0.28 SM rated voltage (VSM ) 1 kV 1 kV
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 SM capacitance (C SM ) 0.83 mF 0.83 mF
Time (ms) Number of SBRs per branch (M) 2 3
SBR inductance (L br) 5 mH 7.5 mH
FIG 11 The reference power profile used to test the dynamic
operation of simulated converters. In all of the simulated SBR resistance (R br) 60 mX 60 mX
cases, the normalization was performed with respect to the PWM carrier frequency ( fc ) 999 Hz 999 Hz
rated powers provided in Table 1.
2,400
Voltages (V)
vgA
vgB
Grid
0
vgC
–2,400
270 igA
Currents (A)
igB
Grid
0
igC
–270
200
Current (A)
idc
dc Link
100
0
–100
210 ipA
Currents (A) Currents (A)
Branch
Upper
ipB
0 ipC
–130
210
inA
Branch
Lower
inB
0
inC
–140
Voltages (V) Voltages (V)
Lower SBR Upper SBR
1,100
990
890
1,100
1,000
910
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3

Time (s)
FIG 12 The operation of the converter utilizing two parallel SBRs within a branch.

2,400
Voltages (V)
vgA
vgB
Grid
0
vgC
–2,400
410 igA
Currents (A)
igB
Grid
0
igC
–410
330
Current (A)
iDC
dc Link
0
–200
310 ipA
Currents (A) Currents (A)
Branch
Upper
ipB
0 ipC
–190
310
inA
Branch
Lower
inB
0
inC
–190
Voltages (V) Voltages (V)
Lower SBR Upper SBR
1,100
990
890
1,100
990
890
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3

Time (s)
FIG 13 The operation of the converter utilizing three parallel SBRs within a branch.
notice that it is mainly occupied by the control blocks already To test the dynamic performance of simulated convert-
known in the domain of the conventional MMC control. As ers, the reference power profiles defined in Figure 11 were
indicated, another, although decoupled, control layer con- followed. Furthermore, to demonstrate the importance of
cerning the balancing of the SBR energies must be superim- the SBR energy-balancing controller, its actions were dis-
posed to the higher control layers. It is important to empha- abled during the time interval T OFF
W ! [1.5 s, 2.5 s], as high-
BAL
size that the presented SBR energy-balancing method does lighted in Figure 11. To validate the proposed energy-bal-
not depend on the parity of the number of SBRs connected in ancing method while demonstrating its robustness, ! 20 %
parallel and this statement, which is verified shortly. mismatches were randomly included in the SBR induc-
tances as well as the SM capacitances.
Simulation Results Figure 12 presents the operation of the converter, utiliz-
The availability of an SM intended to serve the 0.5 MW con- ing two SBRs per branch, whereas Figure 13 illustrates the
verter, being connected to the 3-kV ac grid on one side and identical scenario, but with the converter utilizing three
5-kV dc grid on the other side is assumed. To demonstrate the SBRs per branch. Both converters successfully track the
possibilities of increasing the power capacity of the original reference power profile, which can be concluded based on
converter, cases with two and three SBRs operating in paral- the presented dc link current shape.
lel within a branch are simulated in PLECS. Consequently, the The lower-most plots present voltages of the lower
power rating of the original converter is doubled and tripled, SBRs, whereas zoomed-in parts tend to showcase the
respectively. Simulation parameters can be found in Table 1. contributions of the additional SBR energy-balancing

110
ipA,1 inA,1
Currents (A)
Upper SBR ipA,2 inA,2
Leg A
0
–40
(a)
Voltages (kV)
1.1
Upper SBR
Leg A
0.9
0.78 0.79 0.8 0.81 2.24 2.25 2.26 2.79 2.8 2.81 2.82
Time (s)
(b)
FIG 14 The (a) leg A upper and lower SBR currents and the (b) leg A upper branch voltages. In spite of the SBR currents being bal-
anced, the SBR voltages tend to diverge in case the SBR energy-balancing controller is deactivated (middle part of the plot). The
number of parallel SBRs per branch was set as M = 2.
110
ipA,1 inA,1
Currents (A)
Upper SBR
ipA,2 inA,2
Leg A
ipA,3 inA,3
0
–40
1.1 (a)
Voltages (kV)
Upper SBR
Leg A
0.9
0.78 0.79 0.8 0.81 2.24 2.25 2.26 2.79 2.8 2.81 2.82
Time (s)
(b)
FIG 15 The (a) leg A upper and lower SBR currents and the (b) leg A upper branch voltages. In spite of the SBR currents being bal-
anced, the SBR voltages tend to diverge in case the SBR energy-balancing controller is deactivated (middle part of the plot). The
number of parallel SBRs per branch was set as M = 3.
controller. It can be observed that, before this controller Similar to Figure 14, the importance of the SBR energies-
was disabled, the SBR voltages remained perfectly bal- balancing controller, in case M = 3, can be observed from
anced (the left-most zooms in on the bottom-most plots). Figure 15. Conclusions identical to the ones already pro-
However, upon its deactivation at t = 1.5 s , the SM voltages vided in the previous paragraph can be made.
of all of the SBRs start to diverge (the middle zoomed-
in images). At the time instant t = 2.5 s , the SBR energy- Conclusions
balancing controller was reactivated, resulting in the bal- This article presents the method of extending the power
anced SBR voltages in both of the presented cases (the capacity of the MMC by paralleling its SBRs. The pro-
right-most zoomed images). posed control method enables the balancing of energies
Figure 14 presents the leg A lower and upper branch among the converter SBRs while keeping their currents
currents, along with the upper branch voltages, during the partially balanced at all times. For an available SM design,
zoomed-in subintervals in Figure 12. SBR currents remain the rated power of the converter can be effortlessly multi-
balanced, owing to the actions of the SBR currents-balanc- plied without the need for a major redesign of the existing
ing controller presented in Figure 9. However, notwithstand- converter parts. Consequently, the realization of cost-effec-
ing the SBR currents balance, SBR voltage divergence can tive solutions that require minimal engineering efforts is
be observed in the middle plot, which corresponds to the enabled. Also, the proposed SBR energy-balancing method
period at which the SBR energy-balancing controller was does not depend on the number of parallel SBRs. Hence,
still deactivated. the scalability of the MMC depends exclusively on the

MMC Research Platform
Currently, the Power Electronics Laboratory, Ecole Polytechnique 1.2-kV insulated-gate bipolar transistors. The SM incorporates a
Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland, is finalizing its modular multilevel flyback-based auxiliary power supply, DSP-based controller, protection
converter (MMC) platform, which will be used to support research logic, and circuitry involving fast temporary thyristor bypass and
activities like the ones presented in this article. The MMC submodule permanent relay bypass, as well as the fiber-optical communication
(SM) shown in Figure S1 is the full-bridge type and is based on the link to the upper-layer controller. A complete cabinet system that will
FaultGD1...4
swGD1...4
+5 V +3.3 V
swTHY
swREL
TIGBT
PSfail
VHB1
VHB2
VSM
LDO
OV
ibr
+3.3 V +80 V
GND
THYON
Upper Level Tx
Control CTRL PROT
Rx
RELON
GND GNDprot
IGBT Module
VSM +15 VGD1 HB1 HB2 +15 V
GD3
CSM
Flyback + swGDI SWGD3 THYB RELB OVD
ASPS GD
faultGD1 faultGD3
Hybrid
Balancing GNDGD1 GNDGD3 VHB1
TIGBT
+
Discharge +15 VGD2 +15 VGD4 VHB2
+
4 SWTHY
SWREL
swGD2
OV
swGD4
ibr
GD
PSfail
faultGD2 faultGD4
+15 VGD1...4
+5 V
+80 V
GND
(a)
(b)
FIG S1 The MMC FB SM (a) principal layout and (b) implementation.

soon host two MMCs (a combined
power of 0.5 MVA) is shown in
Figure S2. Each MMC has 3.3-kV
ratings on its ac terminals and
± 5-kV ratings on its dc terminals.
A detailed description of the SM can
be found in [S1].
Reference
[S1] M. Utvic, I. P. Lobos, and D. Dujic,
“Low voltage modular multilevel con-
verter submodule for medium voltage
applications,” in Proc. PCIM Europe
2019; Int. Exhibition and Conf. Power
Electronics, Intelligent Motion, Renew-
FIG S2 The MMC platform (in the assembly phase). The two left-hand side cabinets are hosting able Energy and Energy Management,
air-core branch inductances, while three cabinets on the right-hand side host SMs of two MMCs. May 2019, pp. 1–8.
employed control platform, removing the SM hardware- Outstanding Achievement in Power Electronics. He is a
design constraints from the list of possible factors limiting Senior Member of the IEEE.
the amount of power reached with an existing SM design.
The effectiveness of the proposed control method was val- References
idated under realistic conditions, implying the mismatches [1] A. Lesnicar and R. Marquardt, “An innovative modular multilevel
randomly distributed among the branch inductances as converter topology suitable for a wide power range,” in IEEE Bologna
well as the SM capacitances. By means of the simple, well- Power Tech Conf. Proc., 2003, vol. 3, pp. 272–277. doi: 10.1109/PTC.2003.
known, and easily tuned linear controllers, the converter 1304403.
energy balance was ensured, indicating that extremely [2] A. Nami, J. Liang, F. Dijkhuizen, and G. D. Demetriades, “Modular mul-
robust operation can be guaranteed. Upcoming research is tilevel converters for HVDC applications: Review on converter cells and
discussed in “MMC Research Platform.” functionalities,” IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 30, no. 1, pp. 18–36, 2015.
doi: 10.1109/TPEL.2014.2327641.
About the Authors [3] J. Kolb, F. Kammerer, M. Gommeringer, and M. Braun, “Cascaded con-
Stefan Milovanovic (stefan.milovanovic@epfl.ch) is a trol system of the modular multilevel converter for feeding variable-speed
postdoctoral researcher with the Power Electronics Labo- drives,” IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 30, no. 1, pp. 349–357, 2015. doi:
ratory at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne 10.1109/TPEL.2014.2299894.
(EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland. He received his Dipl.Ing. [4] A. Volke, J. Wendt, and M. Hornkamp, IGBT Modules: Technologies,
and M.Sc. degrees from the University of Belgrade, Serbia, Driver and Application. Neubiberg, Germany: Infineon, 2012.
in 2015 and 2016, respectively, and his Ph.D. degree from [5] R. Hermann and S. Bernet, “Parallel connection of integrated gate com-
EPFL in 2020, all in electrical engineering. His research is mutated thyristors (IGCTs) and diodes,” IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol.
focused on medium- and high-voltage power conversion. He 24, no. 9, pp. 2159–2170, 2008. doi: 10.1109/TPEL.2009.2021837.
is a Member of the IEEE. [6] M. Vasiladiotis, N. Cherix, and A. Rufer, “Accurate capacitor voltage
Drazen Dujic (drazen.dujic@epfl.ch) is an assistant ripple estimation and current control considerations for grid-connected
professor and head of the Power Electronics Laboratory at modular multilevel converters,” IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 29, no. 9,
the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), pp. 4568–4579, 2014. doi: 10.1109/TPEL.2013.2286293.
Switzerland. He received his Dipl.Ing. and M.Sc. degrees [7] M. M. Steurer et al., “Multifunctional megawatt-scale medium voltage
from the University of Novi Sad, Serbia, in 2002 and 2005, DC test bed based on modular multilevel converter technology,” IEEE
respectively, and his Ph.D. degree from Liverpool John Trans. Transp. Electrific., vol. 2, no. 4, pp. 597–606, 2016. doi: 10.1109/
Moores University, United Kingdom, in 2008, all in electrical TTE.2016.2582561.
engineering. From 2009 to 2014, he was with ABB Switzer- [8] S. Milovanović and D. Dujić, “On facilitating the modular multilevel
land, and since 2014, he has been with the EPFL. His converter power scalability through branch paralleling,” in Proc. IEEE
research interests are predominantly related to high-power Energy Conversion Congr. and Expo., 2019, pp. 6875–6882. doi: 10.1109/
conversion technologies for medium-voltage applications. ECCE.2019.8911850.
He has authored or coauthored more than 150 scientific [9] A. Antonopoulos, L. Angquist, and H.-P. Nee, “On dynamics and voltage
publications and has filed 14 patents. In 2018, he received control of the modular multilevel converter,” in Proc. 13th European Conf.
the EPE Outstanding Service Award, and in 2014, he Power Electronics and Applications, 2009, pp. 1–10.
received the Isao Takahashi Power Electronics Award for

APEC Organizers, Vendors
Take Virtual Route to Reveal
Latest Trends in Power
Technologies and Products
A cancelled
conference taps
alternate
methods to
disseminate
cutting-edge
information
by Ashok Bindra
©ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/DENIZBAYRAM
W
ith the growing concerns of the worldwide Despite the challenges and adversities of COVID-19, the
coronavirus pandemic, the IEEE Power organizers worked diligently to virtually bring the confer-
Electronics Society/Industrial Applications ence and its presentations to the registered community via
Society (PELS/IAS) and Power Supply Manu- the APEC 2020 app and the eventScribe web portal. As a
facturers Association-sponsored 2020 Applied result, I was given a password (access key) to access the
Power Electronics Conference and Exposition (APEC 2020) site and view a variety of the sessions. Before I go through
in New Orleans, Louisiana, was cancelled for the safety of the conference papers and sessions, I would like to take the
the attendees. While it was a difficult decision, the health, opportunity to mention the vendors who promptly called
safety, and welfare of the community was paramount for IEEE Power Electronics Magazine and presented the
the organizers and sponsors of the 15–19 March 2020 con- latest trends in technologies and products online. The
ference. Although this was the first such cancellation in unbelievable situation created by the COVID-19 outbreak
APEC’s 35-year history, the organizers were quick to offer a did not deter the vendors and emerging companies from
virtual conference to those registered. In addition, peer- taking their latest advances and developments to editors
reviewed papers accepted by the conference committee and reporters via phone and virtual meetings and booths.
were submitted to IEEE Xplore and are available to all. As a result, I was lucky to talk to a variety of power semicon-
ductor companies, passive component suppliers, and power
electronics experts, including marketing analysts, and
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 gather the latest advances in power electronics technology.

Starting with market analysis, I first officer (CEO) and cofounder of EPC, “eGaN
went to the market research firm Yole The COVID-19 out- devices have been in volume production
Développement and obtained the current for over 10 years and have demonstrated
market situation with projections for the break did not very high reliability in both laboratory
next few years for wide bandgap (WBG) deter the vendors testing and high-volume customer applica-
devices. During APEC 2019, after years tions. The release of EPC’s 11th reliability
of development, the focus was on WBG
and emerging report represents the cumulative experi-
device reliability and the emerging appli- companies from ence of millions of devices over a 10-year
cations getting ready for adoption. The lat- period and five generations of technology.
est WBG study by Yole shows that numer-
taking their latest These reliability tests have been under-
ous consumer fast charger applications, advances and taken to continue our understanding the
such as smartphones, tablets, and note- behavior of GaN devices over a wide range
developments to
books, have adopted gallium nitride (GaN) of stress conditions.”
devices and entered the production phase. editors and Concurrently, EPC introduced an
reporters via 80-V, 12.5-A power stage IC for 48-V dc–dc
GaN Power ICs and Modules conversion used in high-density comput-
Early adopters of GaN devices include phone and virtual ing and motor drives. The first member in
after-market fast charger companies like meetings and the ePower stage IC family is EPC2152, a
Anker, Ravpower, and Hyperjuice. In addi- monolithic GaN power IC that integrates
tion, GaN power devices have also entered booths. on-chip input logic interface, level shift-
Oppo’s inbox high-power fast chargers and ing, bootstrap charging, and gate drive
Samsung’s accessory mobile fast chargers. buffer circuits along with eGaN output
“This is only the beginning of the power GaN market’s emer- FETs configured as a half-bridge (Figure 1). Housed in a
gence,” asserts Ezgi Dogmus, a technology and market ana- chip-scale land grid array form factor, it measures only 3.9
lyst at Yole. “GaN has taken an important leap in its chal- × 2.6 × 0.63 mm. According to EPC, when used in a 48-V to
lenging course and is expected to also enter other major 12-V buck converter at 1-MHz design, it can achieve more
original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), such as Apple than 96% efficiency and 33% smaller size on the printed
and Huawei fast chargers. In this context, 2020 and 2021 are circuit board as compared to an equivalent multichip dis-
important years to watch for further market acceptance and crete implementation.
the speed of GaN-based high power chargers’ proliferation.” EPC plans to expand its GaN-based ePower stage IC
As a result, Yole predicts a market worth more than US$350 family with members operating at higher frequencies up
million in 2024, posting a compound annual growth rate to 5 MHz and current ratings going from 15 A to 30 A. For
(CAGR) from 2018 to 2024 of 85%. evaluation, the company has readied a development board
Driving this growth are vendors like Navitas Semiconduc- EPC90120 featuring EPC2152 and all other critical compo-
tor, Efficient Power Conversion Corporation (EPC), Power nents, including magnetics.
Integration, Texas Instruments (TI), Infineon Technologies, Last year, Power Integrations (PI) President and CEO
GaN Systems, and Transphorm, to name a few. Speaking of Balu Balakrishnan announced in-house development of
production, more than 50 smartphone and laptop chargers
have been enabled by Navitas Semiconductor’s GaNFast
integrated circuits (ICs). According to Navitas’ Vice Presi-
dent of Sales and Marketing Stephen Oliver, “Customers VDD VBOOT VIN
from NVIDIA to Xiaomi have leveraged the high-speed capa-
Sync
bilities of GaNFast power ICs to create the world’s smallest,
Boot
thinnest and lightest power adapters and fast chargers.” The
HSIN
company’s Chief Technology Officer, Dan Kinzer said, “We Level Output
are very proud of our excellent quality track record, with zero Shift Driver
GaN-related field failures after shipping millions of units in Logic SW
the last two years.” +
UVLO VDD
Likewise, using its eGaN FETs and power ICs, EPC con-
LSIN
tinues to power a variety of applications, ranging from Output

e-bike motors to lidar and wireless power charging. In Driver
addition, its eGaN FETs and ICs have also been meeting
GND GND
the stringent requirements of the latest generation of dc–
dc converters used in high-density server architectures.
Meanwhile, the company also released its phase 11 reli- FIG 1 A function block diagram of ePower stage EPC2152.
ability report. According to Alex Lidow, chief executive GND: ground. (Source: EPC; used with permission.)

efficiency and three times higher power den-
sity than silicon while supporting bus volt-
ages up to 1,400 V. In summary, the ac–dc
inverter was optimized to deliver 5 kW from
SR FET 400-V three-phase ac to 800-V dc with only
natural convection for cooling. This ac–dc
inverter design uses 18 600-V GaN FETs
switching at 140 kHz.
“Shrinking form factors, increasing per-
FWD
GND
BPS
SR
FB
D V formance, and extending robustness are key
InnoSwitch3-CP
Vout market trends driving the next-generations
Primary Switch RS systems,” asserted Steve Tom, TI’s GaN prod-
and Controller
uct line manager. Speaking of robustness, he
s BPP IS Secondary
added, “GaN devices have been tested for
Control IC
>30 million device reliability hours and
>3 GWh of power conversion to-date.”
FIG 2 The new offline switcher IC InnoSwitch3 uses PI’s PowiGaN technology. Other suppliers driving the market include
(Source: Power Integrations; used with permission.) Infineon Technologies, GaN Systems, and
Transphorm, among others. For applica-
GaN technology called PowiGaN for rapid conversion from tions that demand high power with higher efficiency (>93%)
silicon transistors to GaN in many ac–dc power conver- and power density, Infineon has added 600-V e-mode high-
sion applications. At the virtual APEC this March, PI dem- electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) with a dedicated
onstrated a fully integrated GaN solution for system-level GaN EiceDriver to its CoolGaN family. Taking to the vir-
power supplies used in chargers, adapters, and open frame tual route, GaN Systems’ CEO Jim Witham discussed the
supplies. New members of PI’s highly integrated, offline use of its GaN devices, and high power modules, in a wide
flyback switcher IC family—InnoSwitch3—were the first range of applications including electric vehicle (EV) on-
beneficiaries of PowiGaN switches (Figure 2). The new board chargers, traction inverters, motor drives, and con-
INN3x78C devices incorporate a smaller 750-V PowiGaN sumer applications. Besides disclosing its new Gen2 650-V,
transistor, enabling compact, efficient power supplies 60-A automotive GaN power transistor with AEC-Q101 per-
delivering 27–55 W without heatsinks. The ICs are housed formance, Witham also bragged about the company’s high
in the same high-creepage, safety-compliant InSOP-24D power GaN modules, which include a 650-V/150-A full-bridge
package as larger members of the GaN-based InnoSwitch3 module with integrated driver, a 650-V/150-A half-bridge
families, which target up to 120 W. According to Balakrish- IPM, and a 650-V/300-A three-phase module and driver.
nan, the innovative PowiGaN technology can satisfy mar- Speaking of GaN modules, Transphorm indicated that
ket demand for more efficient, more robust, and more com- China’s Hangzhou Zhongheng Electric Co., Ltd. (HZZH)
pact power supplies while effectively managing costs. has developed an ultra-efficient, GaN-based power mod-
To enable the selection of the best components and ule, the 3-kW ZHR483KS, using the manufacturer’s 650-V
generate the full schematic, magnetics, and bill of mate- GaN devices. Offering 98% efficiency, the 3-kW interleaved
rials from basic parametric inputs, the PowiGaN-based bridgeless totem-pole power factor correction (PFC) module
devices are supported by the PI Expert automated power ZHR483KS offers standardized output connector configura-
supply design software suite, which also supports silicon tions with existing same-wattage power modules to achieve
MOSFET-based devices. “We will be using GaN exten- a high-reliability, higher-performing solution at a lower over-
sively going forward in all our products,” stated Balakrish- all system cost, said Transphorm. HZZH said that the power
nan. “The future of GaN is very bright and we are cer- module is in production and outperforms previous similar
tainly part of it.” modules that employed superjunction silicon MOSFETs.
Similarly, expanding its GaN product line, TI touted a Another entrant into this market is start-up NexGen
broad portfolio of 150-mΩ, 70-mΩ, and 50-mΩ 600-V GaN Power Systems, Inc., who has readied a vertical GaN tran-
FETs in mass production enabling high-density designs in sistor for commercial use (Figure 3). Unlike others who
industrial, telecom, server, and consumer applications. As employ lateral structure, NexGen is the first GaN supplier
part of this announcement, TI unveiled a natural convection- to take vertical GaN transistors to production using its fab-
cooled 900-V, 5-kW bidirectional ac–dc inverter platform rication plant in Syracuse, New York. “We make these verti-
for applications such as automotive, grid-tied storage, and cal GaN transistors at costs that are competitive to silicon
solar energy. It uses four-level flying capacitor topology to MOSFETs and IGBTs,” claimed Dinesh Ramanathan, CEO
feature a 600-V, 50-mΩ GaN FET with integrated driver and and cofounder of NexGen. Using GaN-on-GaN technology,
overcurrent protection in a compact quad flat no-lead (QFN) NexGen has built 1,200-V and 700-V GaN power devices
package along with the C2000 digital controller to enable 99% with on-resistance of 85 mΩ that can switch at higher

frequencies (>1 MHz). According to Ramanathan, “The
small device area of NexGen’s 1,200-V vertical GaN technol-
Source
ogy leads to much smaller device capacitances compared to Gate
1,200-V silicon carbide (SiC) devices at similar RDS(on) and JTE N-G Gate
aN
drain currents. Vertical GaN-based devices are also smaller JTE
than comparable lateral GaN devices which also have a Increased N – Ga
Thickness N Drif
much lower breakdown voltage specification of 600 V.” t Laye
for Higher r
He added, “In particular, Coss (and consequently Qoss and Voltage N + Ga
N Drif
Eoss) is very small, greatly reducing turn-on losses, which t Laye
Drain r
is key to the high efficiency and high switching frequency
operation of applications enabled by vertical GaN junction Increased
Area for
FETs.” NexGen will provide early samples in T0-247-4 and Higher Current
8 × 8 dual-flat no-leads (DFN) packages to customers partici-
pating in its Quick Start Program in the second quarter. FIG 3 A conceptual view of vertical GaN cross section. JTE: junc-
Concurrently, global semiconductor company STMicro- tion termination extension. (Source: NexGen Power Systems;
electronics also announced its entry into the GaN arena. used with permission.)
The company announced a majority stake in French GaN
startup Exagan based in Grenoble, France. Its GaN power been expanding both capacity and product portfolio to meet
switches are designed for manufacturing in standard 200-mm the market demands.
(8-in) wafer fabrications. In a statement, STMicroelectron- Wolfspeed, a Cree company, for example, continues to
ics’ President and CEO Jean-Marc Chery said, “The acquisi- expand its product portfolio with new releases. Lately, the
tion of a majority stake in Exagan is another step forward company added new 650-V SiC MOSFETs to enable next
in strengthening our global technology leadership in power generation EV onboard chargers, data center power sup-
semiconductors and our long-term GaN roadmap, ecosys- plies, and other renewable power systems with leading
tem and business. It comes in addition to ongoing devel- power efficiency. According to Wolfspeed, the new 15-mΩ
opments with CEA-Leti in Tours, France, and the recently- and 60-mΩ 650-V devices, which use Cree’s industry-lead-
announced collaboration with Taiwan Semiconductor ing, third-generation C3M MOSFET technology, deliver up
Manufacturing Company.” to 20% lower switching losses than competing SiC MOS-
FETs, and provide the lowest on-state resistances for higher
SiC Devices and Modules efficiency and power dense solutions.
Similarly, in the SiC arena, the devices are mainly adopted Recently, Cree implemented its 650-V, 60-mΩ (C3M) SiC
by EV/hybrid EV (EV/HEV) applications, EV charging MOSFETs in a 6.6-kW bidirectional converter targeting
infrastructure, and industrial power supplies. Continuing to high-efficiency and high-power-density on-board charg-
proliferate, the Yole report expects the SiC market to reach ing (OBC) applications. This demo board consists of a
beyond US$3 billion by 2025 at a CAGR of 28.5% (Figure 4). bidirectional totem-pole PFC ac–dc stage and an isolated
As a result, suppliers like Wolfspeed, Infineon Technologies, bidirectional dc–dc stage based on a CLLC topology with
ROHM, ON Semiconductor, Microchip, and UnitedSiC have quasi-constant dc link voltage. It utilizes high switching
US$3,500 M 60
49%
US$3,000 M 50
44% 44%
50%
US$2,500 M
Market Revenue
YoY Growth (%)
40
US$2,000 M
24% 30
US$1,500 M
16% 20
US$1,000 M
13%
US$500 M 10
0
2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
Year
Power SiC Device Market Revenue (MUS$) Forecast YoY Growth (%)
FIG 4 The SiC market forecast. YoY: year-over-year. (Source: Compound Semiconductor Quarterly Market Monitor, Yole Développe-
ment, March 2020; used with permission.)

frequency to enable a smaller, lighter, and overall more power supplies, and server power supplies. While the 1,200-V
cost-effective solution. The 6.6-kW OBC demo board can devices are rated at up to 103 A (ID Max.), the 900-V parts
accept 90–265 VAC input and provide 250–450 VDC at the offer as high as 118 A. For applications requiring higher
output with >96.5% efficiency in both charging and inver- currents, the ON Semiconductor MOSFETs can be eas-
sion modes. ily operated in parallel due to their positive temperature
Employing a state-of-the-art trench semiconductor pro- coefficient/temperature independence, according to Ali
cess, Infineon Technologies added a 650-V SiC MOSFET to Husain, product manager at ON Semiconductor. He further
its CoolSiC MOSFET family. The 650-V CoolSiC MOSFETs indicated that automotive qualified versions are AEC-Q100
are rated from 27 mΩ to 107 mΩ and are available in clas- qualified and Production Part Approval Process capable.
sic TO-247 3-pin as well as TO-247 4-pin packages, which All of the new SiC MOSFETs are housed in industry stan-
allows for even lower switching losses. To ensure high- dard TO-247 or D2PAK packages with on-resistance rang-
performance operation of these devices, the supplier offers ing from 20 to 80 mΩ.
dedicated one-channel and two-channel galvanically iso- Also, leading the SiC march to mainstream is Unit-
lated EiceDRIVER gate-driver ICs. edSiC, based in Monmouth Junction, New Jersey. The
To tap the growing market for SiC power devices, Micro- latest addition to its SiC FET series is the 750-V cas-
chip Technology also unveiled an expanded family of code transistor with RDS(on) of 6 mΩ, the lowest figure
Schottky barrier diode (SBD)-based power modules with 700, for 750-V SiC devices in a DFN 8 × 8 package. It offers
1,200, and 1700-V breakdown capability. Available in a variety a current rating of 18 A (limited by wire count in the
of forms, they come in dual diode, full-bridge, phase leg, dual package), and a maximum operating temperature of
common cathode, and three-phase bridge configurations, in 150 °C. Additionally, the parts also feature a Kelvin gate
addition to different current and package options. It comple- return to enable cleaner drive characteristics. The com-
ments its discrete MOSFET portfolio. Because optimal gate pany uses its fourth generation SiC process to reduce on-
drivers are critical for efficiently driving SiC MOSFETs, the resistance per unit area while improving Qrr and Eon /Eoff
company acquired gate driver specialist AgileSwitch late last losses at a given Rds(on). Meanwhile, AC Propulsion has
year. Combining AgileSwitch’s digital programmable gate readied power modules using UnitedSiC’s 4-lead 1,200-V
drivers with its discrete SiC MOSFETs and SBDs, including SiC FETs for a 200-kW drive unit inverter. It delivers >99%
microcontrollers, Microchip is now building system-level efficiency. According to Vice President of Engineering
solutions for a variety of EV, industrial, and military applica- Anup Bhalla, UnitedSiC will also employ its bare die FETs
tions. One such design kit is a reference design for a 150-kVA to produce SiC power modules as standard products. The
three-phase SiC power stack developed in conjunction with company plans to release them to production in the sec-
Mersen (Figure 5). A 30-kW three-phase Vienna PFC refer- ond half of this year.
ence design for EV/HEV charger and high-power switched- Flaunting its fourth generation trench process, ROHM
mode power supply applications was also developed prior Semiconductor introduced its low on-resistance 650- and
to AgileSwitch becoming a part of Microchip. 1,200-V SiC MOSFETs with gate voltage of 15 V. ROHM’s pre-
Likewise, ON Semiconductor expanded its WBG portfo- vious generation SiC MOSFETs were rated for 18-V VGS . To
lio with the introduction of new 900-V and 1,200-V n-channel keep them cost competitive, the manufacturer will produce
SiC MOSFETs for high-growth applications like solar power these parts on a 6-in substrate.
inverters, EV OBCs and charging stations, uninterruptible Additionally, PI unveiled an AEC-Q100 certified gate
driver IC for SiC MOSFETs used in automotive applica-
tions. Labeled SIC118xKQ SCALE-iDriver, this high-effi-
ciency, single-channel device incorporates sophisticated
safety and protection features to support the gate-drive
voltage requirements of commonly used SiC MOSFETs.
The SIC1182KQ (1200-V) and SIC1181KQ (750-V) gate driver
ICs incorporate PI’s revolutionary FluxLink communica-
tion technology, providing unparalleled isolation capabil-
ity and enabling safe, cost-effective designs for inverters
up to 300 kW. Key features include optimized advanced
active clamping, undervoltage lock-out for primary and
secondary side, ultrafast short-circuit detection, rail-to-
rail stabilized output voltage, and unipolar supply voltage
for secondary side.
FIG 5 A 150 kVA three-phase SiC power stack using an Agile- Silicon Products and Assembly Material
Switch gate driver. (Source: Microchip Technology; used with Concurrently, silicon vendors are also displaying their capa-
permission.) bilities and advances made to stay competitive with emerging

technologies. Silanna Semiconductor, for instance, launched include field-programmable gate arrays, CPUs, and data-
a higher-power and smaller form factor active-clamp fly- com/telecom systems. The buck regulator features an input
back controller IC using 0.35 μm CMOS process. Employ- voltage range of 6–14.4 V and a programmable output of
ing the company’s OptiMode digital control architecture, 0.7–1.8 V at up to 6 A. Housed in a package measuring
the new controller (SZ1110 and SZ1130) adjusts the device’s 9 × 10.5 × 2.1 mm, the module offers a 25% lower profile
mode of operation on a cycle-by-cycle basis to maintain than competing products. Other improvements include
high efficiency, low electromagnetic interference (EMI), 5× reduction in input ripple, lower EMI, and a wide tempera-
fast dynamic load regulation and other key power supply ture range of –40 to +105 °C.
parameters in response to varying line voltage and load. Traditional silicon giants Infineon and TI were also
“Unlike conventional active clamp flyback (ACF) designs, demonstrating their respective silicon-based power de -
tight tolerances of the clamp capacitor and leakage induc- vices for myriad applications. Infineon, for instance, dis-
tance values are not required for proper operation of the closed a family of integrated point-of-load (POL) regulator
circuit in high-volume production,” asserted Ahsan Zaman, modules, the OptiMOS IPOL, with a fast constant-on time
director of marketing at Silanna. According to the manufac- engine for improved output regulation and higher switch-
turer, the ACF ICs are well-suited for high-efficiency and ing frequency (up to 2 MHz). This multichip all-ceramic
high-power-density ac–dc power adapters used in laptops capacitor design offers best-in-class steady-state regulation
and notebooks. They are designed for up to 33-W (SZ1110) without external compensation while providing for a wide-
and 65-W (SZ1130) output power, including USB-PD and input voltage range of 2.0–17 V and 0.8-V precision output
quick charge applications. The silicon-based ACF ICs will voltage. Consisting of three members, the 25-A IR3888M,
be qualified in June 2020 with volume production in the 30-A IR3887M, and 30-A IR3889M, this family is housed in
third quarter. compact power QFN packages, targeting server, storage,
According to Silanna’s CEO, Mark Drucker, the ACF and data communications/telecommunications applica-
controller is technology agnostic, so it is feasible to work tions. Likewise, TI introduced a stackable 40-A dc-dc buck
with alternative switching technologies in the future. Cur- converter in a 5-mm × 7-mm QFN package. This is a highly
rently, the company is using 700-V LDMOS MOSFETs in the integrated, non-isolated buck converter, and up to four such
ac–dc power supply package. In addition, the company is devices can be interconnected to provide up to 160 A on a
also developing dc–dc converters using its new controller, single output. Labeled TPS546D24A, it features selectable
targeted to be released shortly. high switching frequency (up to 1.5 MHz) and PMBus inter-
Combining its expertise in passives and 3D packaging face and uses an integrated 0.9-mΩ low-side MOSFET for
with unique two-stage architecture, Murata has developed higher efficiency and wide input and output voltage range.
a whole new generation of power management ICs and mod- A two-phase evaluation module is also available.
ules for notebooks and other similar applications. “This Newer semiconductor devices and power electronics
unique architecture halves the losses and shrinks the size components are presenting unusual challenges for assem-
of inductor required,” stated Stephen J. Allen, pSemi’s senior bly on boards and substrates. Toward that goal, materials
director of strategic marketing. pSemi is a Murata company supplier Indium Corporation continues to innovate and
focused on semiconductor integration. Consequently, the advance assembly materials technology. In March, Indium’s
maker has released two new series of dc–dc converters. senior product manager for solder preform and thermal
The MYW series from the MonoBK dc–dc converter family technology, Tim Jensen, introduced new products for die
offers a 50% smaller footprint as compared to competing attach applications in power semiconductor assembly and
solutions and high efficiency, while the 6-A buck regula- thermal interface materials (TIMs) for better thermal con-
tor delivers high efficiency from a low-profile, compact ductivity in these applications. The first new metallurgical
package. The MonoBK MYW series are four-channel dc–dc advancement was QuickSinter, a new pressureless silver
converters that integrate all passive components, includ- sintering dispense paste that can also be used in pressured
ing inductors, into a tiny form factor of 9.3 mm × 9 mm ×
2.9 mm (Figure 6). The products feature an input voltage
range of 2.8–5.5 V and programmable outputs of 0.4–3.58 V
up to 3 A. Most applications will require few external com-
ponents, said the supplier.
The maker claims that its unique packaging process
allows the module to offer high thermal performance that
can support a wide temperature range of –40 to +105 °C.
Based on a fixed-frequency synchronous buck converter
switching topology, this high-efficiency point-of-load mod-
ule features on/off control and power-good signal out FIG 6 Murata’s MonoBK MYW dc–dc converter integrates all
as well as protections for overcurrent, overvoltage, under- passive components, including inductors, in a tiny form factor
voltage, and overtemperature. Target power applications of 9.3 × 9 × 2.9 mm. (Source: Murata; used with permission.)

processes. By comparison to other sintering products that The second presentation was by David Dwelley, vice
require silver metallization to create a reliable bond, Quick- president and chief technology officer, Maxim Integrated.
Sinter bonds directly and fast to copper surfaces and can His talk, “Power in Automotive: Performance in Several
be sintered using conventional reflow equipment. Plus, Dimensions,” looks beyond power and shows that there are
according to the company’s product development road map, several other important areas to consider when designing
future innovations will lead to copper sintering materials. power supplies. They are quality and diagnostics, safety,
The second assembly material was InFORMS, a reinforced functionality, qualification, and documentation. These
matrixed solder composite for die attach applications (Fig- important items, as well as traditional power performance,
ure 7). Per Jensen’s explanation, InFORMS are solder pre- need to be designed in at the start of the product develop-
forms with embedded metal matrix for bondline control ment project. In this presentation, Dwelley discusses strate-
and improved reliability. “Future innovations include addi- gies to create power devices that meet the wide variety of
tional options for fixed bondlines and innovative matrix automotive performance requirements.
technologies to further decrease voiding,” stated Jensen. In the third talk, “Emerging Technologies in Power Elec-
Lastly, the product manager unveiled TIMs, which include tronics,” Burak Ozpineci of Oak Ridge National Laboratory
solid metal Heat-Spring, solid/liquid hybrid, and amalgams. focused on EV drive charging challenges and approaches to
The company’s patented Heat-Spring is a soft metal with a achieve high power densities and fast charging. In addition,
unique pattern to improve compressibility. The solid/liquid Ozpineci also covered other emerging technologies such
hybrids are novel materials that combine metals that are as additive manufacturing, artificial intelligence/machine
liquid at room temperature with solid metals to provide a learning, cybersecurity issues, and high-performance com-
product that is applied like a thermal grease but performs puting and their use in power electronics. The abstract for
5–20 × better. And the amalgam offering is a product that is the fourth talk, “Switched Capacitor Power Electronic Con-
applied as a liquid but converts to a solid material by react- verters” by Prof. Robert Pilawa-Podgurski of the University
ing with itself at or near room temperature. of California, Berkeley, proposes novel circuit topologies
and control techniques to meet the future power density
Virtual Plenary and Industry Sessions and efficiency demands. It reveals key areas of research
As in the past, there were six virtual plenary session talks for further improvements in power density and efficiency,
this year. Prof. John Kassakian of the Massachusetts Insti- along with considerations of reliability and cost.
tute of Technology, and founding president of PELS, kicked The next presentation was “Power Electronics for
off the session with his talk “Power Electronics: Where Consumer Applications” by Power Integrations CEO Balu
Have We Been? Where Are We Going?” He suggested that, Balakrishnan. It details the market forces driving prod-
with the invention of the silicon-controlled rectifier at GE, uct developments and the response to those demands by
followed by the development of the first silicon power tran- semiconductor manufacturers. His talk discusses how
sistors, power electronics became an explicit focus of the the combined requirements of efficiency, robustness, and
IEEE in 1983 with the formation of the Power Electronics compactness have driven the first high-volume use of high-
Council. The launching of IEEE APEC in 1986 and the cre- voltage GaN transistors, as well as the implementation of
ation of PELS in 1988 solidified its role in the IEEE. Applica- thermal foldback, and load-driven real-time voltage and
tions have grown rapidly, as have component and manufac- current adjustments with tens of millivolt and milliam-
turing technologies. Today, “we are challenged to meet pere accuracy—achieving all of this performance while
requirements of evolving applications that demand multidis- maintaining affordability. The abstract for the final pre-
ciplinary thinking, high levels of integration, very high effi- sentation, “SiC Power Technology: Answering Automotive
ciencies, high gravimetric and volumetric specific power, Readiness,” by John Palmour of Wolfspeed, shows that a
and significant cross-field collaboration,” stated Prof. Kassa- significant number of automotive OEMs are now targeting
kian. “Industrial processes, EVs, robotics, decreasing logic SiC MOSFETs to power drive trains. As this market grows,
voltages, electric aircraft, attention to energy conservation the push to 200-mm substrates is inevitable, and these have
and global warming, and even 5G are providing power elec- been demonstrated in R&D activities, says Palmour.
tronics with a fertile and exciting future,” he added. The APEC technical program offered many industry ses-
sions spread over three days that reveal emerging technol-
ogy trends in the field. While it is not possible to look into
Level Substrate all of the sessions, I will explore a few. One such session
Copper (#IS02), “Data Center Power Solution Ecosystem,” is chaired
by Shuai Jiang and Mobashar Yazdani of Google LLC. There
Even InForm are seven papers in this session with a focus on 48-V technol-
Thickness
Baseplate ogy, server architecture, and digital power. The first paper,
“Driving 48-V Technology Innovations Forward—Hybrid
FIG 7 InFORMS is a reinforced matrixed solder composite for Converters and Trans-Inductor Voltage Regulator (TLVR)”
die attach application. (Source: Indium Corporation.) is written by Google engineers. They are Shuai Jung, Xin

Li, Mobashar Yazdani, and Chee Chung. It begins by pro- Overall, the program offered four workshops on topics
viding an overview of a 48-V dc–dc power architecture and ranging from magnetics to transportation electrification,
hybrid converter basics, including the evolution of hybrid 12 professional education seminars, six plenary talks, 30
converters in data centers. This is followed by a discussion industry sessions, 19 technical dialog sessions, and 40 tech-
on TLVR operating principles and transient response, and nical sessions.
physical implementation. In summary, this paper shows In the technical sessions program, there were many ses-
that a two-stage 48-V dc–dc power solution ecosystem is sions devoted to renewable energy, WBG devices, compo-
being established and hybrid converters are emerging as nents and magnetics, and cutting-edge power converters.
attractive solutions for the 48-V one-stage fixed-ratio or The growing popularity of EVs has stimulated many ses-
regulated intermediate bus conversion. An advantage of sions addressing the challenges of building power trains,
TLVR technology is that it clears the long-standing theoreti- driving motors, and fast charging batteries.
cal bandwidth barrier. More innovation is needed for this In the renewable arena, session T03 offered several
application, as noted by the Google engineers. papers on renewable energy applications and highlighted
Another paper on 48-V server platform architecture is the move to 200-mm wafers for GaN-on-silicon HEMTs,
written by engineers from Intel Corp. In this paper, “48-V and papers T12.4 and session T08 addressed the challenges
Server Platform Architecture and Design Challenges,” of building PV inverters and microinverters. Advances in
Intel designers Horthense Tamdem, Meng Wang, Behzad battery integration, management, and protection were pre-
Vafakhah, Yinghua Ye, and Fan Zhengguo show that it sented in session T27 with a focus on energy storage sys-
requires multiple sources for a cost-efficient ecosystem and tems. Revealing a number of trends, the WBG space was
an industry standard for 48-V layout guidelines, as well as covered in numerous sessions: T12 on “GaN/Si Devices
efficiency above 98% for regulated 48-V to 12-V converter and Components,” T20 on “SiC Devices and Components,”
solutions. Another paper of interest is on digital power in and T40 on “Wide Bandgap DC-DC Converter and Circuit
the data center by Renesas. It emphasizes the fact that digi- Modeling.” For instance, paper T12.1 highlighted the move
tal VR technology is playing a key role in the move to 48-V to 200-mm wafers for the manufacturing of GaN-on-silicon
data centers. HEMTs. Papers T12.4 and T12.5 identified emerging appli-
Other industry sessions of interest are on vehicle elec- cations benefiting from GaN devices.
trification (IS16), silicon and WBG switch performance Furthermore, the design, modeling, and applications
(IS04), energy harvesting enabling the IoT and 5G (IS11), of wireless power transfer were the focus of session T15,
GaN applications and integration (IS19), and addressing and sessions T16 and T32 divulged advances in transpor-
EMI challenges with WBG devices (IS24). In the session on tation power electronics. Other technical sessions of inter-
production use cases of WBG semiconductors (IS08), there est included sessions on novel ac-dc and dc-dc conversion
are three papers. architectures, covered in T23, T24, and T33.
1) “Cost Effective ToF Lidar Using GaN Devices,” by Despite the current adversities, APEC organizers and
John Glaser and Alex Lidow of EPC, indicates that vendors did a great job in bringing a virtual version of APEC
time of flight (ToF) lidar are finding use in autono- 2020 to its power electronics audience. Alas, nothing can
mous vehicles because of their precise measurement replace in-person meetings. We hope that coronavirus will
capabilities and that GaN can deliver performance to be defeated and that a live in-person APEC 2021 will hap-
meet the requirements for this ToF lidar application. pen next March in Phoenix, Arizona. See you, and stay safe
Citing examples of Waymo’s self-driving cars and and well.
Audi’s Advanced Driver Assistance Systems, the EPC
authors suggest that lidar is the best choice for all About the Author
autonomous vehicles. Ashok Bindra (bindra1@verizon.net) received his M.S.
2) “High-Density 65 W USB-PD GaN Chargers: Market degree from the Department of Electrical and Computer
Demand, Technical Solutions and Pricing,” by Steve Engineering, Clarkson College of Technology (now Clark-
Oliver of Navitas Semiconductor identifies numerous son University), Potsdam, New York, and his M.Sc. degree
65-W and above ac–dc adapters and chargers in the in physics from the University of Bombay, India. He is the
smartphones and laptops that are powered by its GaN editor-in-chief of IEEE Power Electronics Magazine and a
power ICs. This presentation highlights the progress Member of the IEEE. He is a veteran freelance writer and
GaN technology has made in the consumer power editor with more than 35 years of editorial experience cov-
supply market. ering power electronics, analog/radio-frequency technolo-
3) “Leading the GaN Revolution,” by Philip Zuk of Trans- gies, and semiconductors. He has worked for leading elec-
phorm and Sean Luangrath of Inergy demonstrates por- tronics trade publications in the United States, including
table power using examples of a 3-kW electric generator Electronics, EE Times, Electronic Design, Power Electron-
and a 6-kW residential solar system, both based on GaN ics Technology, and RF Design.
devices. Inergy is calling its off-grid whole-home solar
system-in-a-box Home Base.

Patent Reviews
by Art MacCord
Patent Applicant’s
Duty of Disclosure
A
n invention must satisfy cer this is not an electronics technology, technology was commercially suc
tain requirements to be grant the lessons for patent applicants are cessful because the owners were
ed a patent. Among them the same. The inventors worked with granted four U.S. patents and assert
are that the invention, as claimed in a another party to try out the invention, ed some of them against eight differ
patent application, must not describe yielding a favorable result in June ent defendants.
what is known in, or be obvious from, 2003. Enthusiastic about that out The facts about the early develop
the prior art. Another important cri come, the applicants prepared a ment work in June 2003 and the offer
terion is that the invention must not sale proposal for a potential custom to the potential customer on 1 August
have been on sale (which includes er and sent the overture by email on 2003 came to light during the course
offers that are not accepted) more 1 August 2003. The customer did not of discovery for a lawsuit. The ac
than one year before the filing date accept the offer. In February 2004, cused infringers argued that these
of the patent application. What hap the inventors looked facts showed that
pens when an applicant knows there up the requirements the invention was on
is information about one of these to get a patent and The invention, as sale more than one
invalidating events but still wants to learned about the one claimed in a patent year before the filing
get a patent? yearonsale provi date and invalidated
application, must not
A patent applicant may not hide sion. In May 2004, the patents. In the
they talked to a law
describe what is litigation, the court
that information but must bring it to
the attention of the U.S. Patent and yer, who reiterated the known in, or be ruled that the pat
Trademark Office (USPTO). This requirement. The pat obvious from, the ents were invalid
requirement is referred to as the duty ent application was prior art. based on the onsale
of disclosure and has been part of the filed on 18 August bar. The court then
U.S. patent law for decades. The duty 2003, one year and concluded that the
is to disclose information that is 17 days after the emailed offer to the inventors and their attorney had com
material to the patentability of the potential customer. mitted equitable conduct by withhold
invention. The definition of materiali Information about the June 2003 ing that information from the USPTO.
ty has varied through time, but cur test and 1 August 2003 offer to the Usually, the effect of an inequita
rently, information is material if a potential customer was not disclosed bleconduct finding is that all claims
patent examiner would not allow a to the USPTO. However, once the in patents in the same family are
claim if he or she knew about the applicants’ attorney came across a unenforceable—not just the particu
omitted facts. competing patent application, he was lar claim for which the invalidating
A recent case shows what hap given information about the test and information was withheld. In addi
pens when the duty is not met. The able to opine (based upon the law as tion, the patent owner and anyone
invention was a technology for sepa applicable then) that the test could be else found to be participating in ineq
rating oil from the waste product of used to “swear behind” the compet uitable conduct can be liable for the
an ethanol production process. While ing patent application, i.e., to elimi attorneys’ fees of the accused infring
nate it as prior art. However, none of er. Moreover, if the patents obtain
these facts were brought to the atten ed inequitably are used to acquire a
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 tion of the USPTO. Apparently, the monopoly in a relevant market, or to

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As the world’s largest professional
monopoly, the patent The misstep of not cant, be sure you association dedicated to advancing
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neys who have been application before publications, conferences, technology
found to engage in raft of trouble above the year elapses. standards, and professional
and educational activities.
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can face disciplinary of a patent. About the Author Visit www.ieee.org.
proceedings by the Art MacCord (amac

USPTO that can af cord@maccordmason
fect their continuing ability to represent .com) has practiced patent, trademark,
clients before the agency or other copyright, and tradesecret law for
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to comply with the duty of disclosure. of the University of Virginia and
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Publications / IEEE Xplore ® / Standards / Membership / Conferences / Education

Company Profile
by Andy Mackie
Indium Corporation:
Igniting an Electronics Materials
Renaissance in Upstate New York
A
round the world, glowing touch- when Texas Instruments was look-
screens, displays, light-emit- ing for a solder that melted lower
ting diodes (LEDs) in our than 50:50 tin-lead Dr. Murray rec-
homes, mobile devices, and outdoor ommended the lead-free 50:50 indi-
displays are examples of the ubiquity um-tin (InSn) alloy (liquidus 125 °C/
of indium as an element, whose atoms solidus 118 °C), which became the
may well have passed through Indium company’s Indalloy #1. Research led
Corporation manufacturing or recy- to further alloy developments, and
cling facilities on their way into our the options grew every year. Today,
lives. Founded exclusively on the the company’s solder and brazing
properties and applications of the ele- alloy directory has more than 280
ment In49, Indium Corporation has Indalloy entries. The company now
expanded its capabilities over its 86 provides these alloys in a variety of
years of operation into a wide variety forms, including powder, solder paste,
of materials, applications, and mar- and microspheres; and in a variety of
kets. Indium metal itself now repre- shapes, sizes, and thicknesses, as well
FIG 1 Indium Corp. founder, Dr. William
sents only a small part of the compa- as specialty surface treatments of sol-
S. Murray. (Source: Indium Corporation;
ny’s business. Over the decades, the used with permission.) der preforms for power electronics
organization has become a major and similar applications.
materials supplier in areas as diverse After several technological advances In 1933, Indium Corporation was
as automotive, medical, mobile, and with the metal, he realized the many awarded a patent for an indium-gold
aerospace electronics; renewable possibilities, and, in 1934, he founded dental alloy. The company manufac-
energy; wall-size displays; lighting; the Indium Corporation. tured its first solder preform in the
and artificial intelligence. Indium is a soft metal, but like 1940s. This addressed the assembly
many metals, it forms very hard inter- world’s need for precise amounts of
Our History metallics, and, perhaps ironically, one solder in specific locations. This devel-
The history of Indium Corporation is, of the first applications of indium was opment helped set the stage for the
inextricably, tightly linked with the ele- in reducing wear in rotary aircraft eventual electronics miniaturization
ment indium. In 1924, before the com- engine parts. The company’s process demand that swept the world. This
pany’s founding, consulting chemical was patented in 1938 and, in 1942, was followed by developments in tape
engineer Dr. William S. Murray (Figure 1) Indium Corporation was awarded and reel solder preform packaging
was looking for a nontarnishing “sil- the prestigious U.S. Army/Navy “E” that enabled robotic assembly pro-
ver” for Oneida Ltd., a company that Award for engineering excellence for cesses that arose once the demand for
manufactured silver-plated flatware. this technology. high volume, miniaturized electronics
Indium was one of the many ele- For centuries, the off-eutectic assembly gained strength.
ments with which he experimented. 50:50 tin-lead (liquidus 255 °C/soli- In 1982, Indium Corporation added
dus 183 °C) solder was the de facto powder manufacturing capabilities
alloy used for both mechanical and as part of its growing solder paste
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 electrical soldering. In the 1950s, program for the emergent surface

mount technology (SMT) industry. Indium-Based Products
In 1995, its first Asian manufacturing Indium Corporation believes that
hub was established in Singapore. materials science changes the world,
Over the last 25 years, Indium Cor- and their commitment to innovation
poration has continued its global is reflected in the continuing growth
ex pa nsion a nd r e cent ly opened of the company’s R&D department
its 10th manufacturing facility in under the long-term leadership of
Chennai, India. Dr. Ning-Cheng Lee, vice president of
In addition to manufacturing op - technology for Indium Corporation
FIG 2 High-purity indium ingots.
erations in Asia, the company oper- and IEEE Fellow. Indium Corporation
(Source: Indium Corporation; used with
ates a research and development manufactures high-purity (6N and permission.)
center in Suzhou, China; a technical higher) indium ingots (Figure 2), which
hub in Penang, Malaysia; and an are used for making III/V crystalline solder alloys, but it also plays an
i nd iu m rec ycl i ng oper at ion i n wafers and substrates, such as indium important role in transparent con-
Cheongju, South Korea. Indium recy- phosphide (InP) and indium arsenide ductive oxide layers in displays, such
cling is a factor often missed by (InAs). InP laser devices are exten- as indium tin oxide, and also in III/V
economists studying the availability sively used in fiber optic communica- semiconductors. Ultrahigh-purity indi-
of materials, which is why the firm tions for backhaul 5G. um trichloride and gallium trichloride
publishes a report each year that Indium metal’s softness and low are manufactured at the company’s
provides data to show that the world melting point make it ideal for low- facilities in central New York. These
has enough indium metal to satisfy temperature soldering and other chemicals are precursors to the organic
not only our current needs but for applications. In electronics, it can chemical-vapor-deposited compounds
the next 100 years. be found as a component in some used in many In and Ga semiconductor

and similar devices, such as InGaN and leads to poor thermal contact in
InGaAs. Examples are LEDs, vertical- spots. The Heat-Spring TIM is a soft,
cavity surface-emitting lasers, and some highly thermally conductive metal
radar applications. that, under pressure, is capable of
Indium metal is used as a thermal forming a strong interfacial bond
interface material (TIM) to remove that, unlike other TIMs, continues to
heat that can slow and impact elec- improve over time.
tronic devices’ reliability. A flat sheet The company’s products are found
FIG 3 Indium metal can be found in many of soft indium metal may work well in electronic devices almost every-
devices, including LEDs. (Source: Indium as a TIM, but even under ideal condi- where you look (Figure 3):
Corporation; used with permission.) tions, there is some nonplanarity that ■■In the world’s leading mobile de-
vices, ultrafine solder pastes are
used in tiny system-in-package
modules such as are used in G5
front-end modules. Ultralow-resi-
= 0.002 in Typical Die-Attach Preforms due no-clean solder pastes enable
micro-electromechanical systems
lid-attach. Ultralow-residue fluxes
= 0.00035 in AuLTRA ThinFORMS also now feature in logic, memo-
ry, and flip-chip on leadframe
applications, replacing water-sol-
uble fluxes.
■■In automotive electronics, high-lead
and low-alpha die-attach solders
are used inside discrete surface
mount packages, both clip-bonded
and wire-bonded. Indium metals
can be found in LED headlights,
and gold-tin pastes are often used
for LED die-attach. Larger SMT
assemblies are manufactured
FIG 4 AuLTRA ThInFORMS gold-tin preforms. (Source: Indium Corporation; used with with no-clean solder pastes, and
permission.) InFORMS are used in die- and heat-
spreader-attach applications to
control bondline thicknesses in
direct bonded copper and integrat-
ed power modules.
Future Materials in the 2020s

In 2020, the company plans to intro-
duce a number of new products,
Halogen-free including QuickSinter, a series of
pressureless silver sintering solder
flame protection pastes for smaller die-attach appli-
cations such as in wide bandgap
NORWE can already offer alternative
devices (WBG). These also work well
plastics with inherent or halogen-free
flame protection in many fields. in compression sintering. AuLTRA
ultra-thin gold-tin (m.p. 280 °C) sol-
In connection with individual product application
and considering the prices of plastics is a suitable
der preforms (Figure 4) 0.254-mm
flame protection concept to be chosen depending (0.010 in) wide by only 0.0152-mm
on the field of application. (0.0006 in) thick for laser and simi-
You can find the complete material list lar high-power die-attach a p p l i -
on our website. c a t i o n s have been added to the
product line, and nanocopper sinter
norwe.de | norwe.eu | norwe.com pastes are also in development, pend-
ing scale-up.
NORWE-Anz-Halogen-Free_124x86.indd 1 03.04.20 11:27

Mohawk Valley in the 2020s tric vehicles and sustainable power pounds; and Steve DiMeo, president of
From 1990 to 2010, the Indium Corpo- electronics by 2022. Mohawk Valley EDGE.
ration based in Utica, New York, and As we have seen, Indium Corpora-
the Air Force Research Laboratory tion has championed electronics About the Author
based in Rome, New York, maintained assembly materials manufacturing Andy Mackie (amackie@indium
the local momentum in electronics and development in Upstate New York .com) is a senior product manager at
systems and electronics assemb - since 1934. The company is excited by Indium Corporation. He received his
ly materials in Upstate New York’s the region’s current electronics mate- Ph.D. degree in physical chemistry from
Mohawk Valley region. rials renaissance and looking forward the University of Nottingham, United
This region is poised for exciting to its role in the upcoming New York Kingdom, and his M.Sc. degree in col-
growth starting right now. Danish State “SiC corridor,” stretching from loid and interface science from the Uni-
power systems manufacturer Dan- the Utica/Marcy “Power Valley” in the versity of Bristol, United Kingdom. He
foss began assembly operations in west to Albany in the east. is an International Microelectronics
Marcy, New York, in 2017. It plans to Assembly and Packaging Society
hire 300 employees and utilize 11 Acknowledgment (IMAPS) fellow and life member and
power module production lines by My thanks are due to the many contribu- the chair of the Editorial Advisory
2022. Cree Inc., a semiconductor com- tors to this article: Indium Corporation’s Board for Chip Scale Review magazine.
pany, is building its WBG fabrication Chief Executive Officer Greg Evans; He holds patents in novel polymers, gas
facility in Marcy. It will begin ramp- Rick Short, corporate associate vice analysis, and novel solder paste formu-
ing silicon carbide (SiC) wafer manu- president; Dr. Robert Ploessl, manager lation. He is a Member of the IEEE and
facture to meet global needs for SiC of marketing and technology as - the IEEE Power Electronics Society.
substrates and SiC devices for elec- sessment and product manager, com-
IEEE PEM_20200520-7inx4.8in-outline.pdf 1 2020/5/21 上午 10:13:52
CM
MY
CY
CMY

Expert View
by Stephen J. Allen
Capacitive-Based Power
Architectures Gain Ground
I
n traditional single-stage power with advanced packaging technology maximum voltage seen in the circuit.
architecture, the inductor typical- to decrease conduction losses and In contrast, the hybrid architecture
ly dominates the bill of materials, increase conversion efficiency. uses capacitors to hold off voltage,
often occupying 50% of the total cir- How can we disrupt this current and the FETs only see a much lower
cuit area and dictating the solution market dynamic? Inductors are about voltage at each stage in the power
height and footprint. Given that 60 times less efficient from an energy transformation. These low-voltage
inductor size is dictated by switching storage density perspective compared FETs have a significantly better FOM
frequency, most of the power indus- to capacitors. Essen- with lower gate ca -
try has been focused on pushing tially, an inductor pacitance and lower
switching frequencies higher and doing the same work The power industry switching losses. For
exploring alternative FET technolo- as a capacitor needs has been focused on a 12-V point-of-load
gies such as gallium nitride (GaN) to be about 60 times (POL) buck, the com-
pushing switching fre-
that promise much lower figures of larger by volume. If pany uses standard
merit (FOM). However, while GaN capacitors can be quencies higher and 5 -V or 3 -V C MO S
has made substantial inroads to high- used to do most of the exploring alternative FETs available as
voltage applications such as off-line work, the problem FET technologies. library e l e m e n t s
ac-dc inverters, it has yet to show any can be solved anoth- within a standard
substantial performance improve- er way, using off- CMOS process. This
ments in low-voltage (< 60-V) applica- the-shelf passive components and approach compares with typical
tions. This market area is dominated staying with standard CMOS. 20-V-rated FETs used in a single-
with requirements for nonisolated Toward that goal, Murata has stage architecture, allowing the mak-
bucks to provide output voltages developed an innovative hybrid archi- er’s hybrid buck to run at three or
below 1 V, with currents of 100 A or tecture comprising a novel phase- four times higher switching frequen-
more, and where space is critical. interleaved charge pump coupled cy with the same efficiency as a sin-
Many challenges must be resolved with either a buck or boost stage with gle-stage buck, achieving commensu-
before GaN becomes mainstream in all switches and control in a single rately better light load efficiency and
low-voltage applications. These monolithic CMOS die. In its simplest helping to reduce the inductor size.
include a lack of inductors suited to form, this architecture breaks down Furthermore, since the charge
10 MHz and above, how to resolve voltage transformation into many pump does most of the work, the in-
electromagnetic interference (EMI) small voltage steps between input ductive stage is presented with a
issues that surface above 5 MHz in and output using capacitors to do much higher duty cycle, which in turn
nonisolated applications, and the the work, rather than the traditional reduces the amount of inductance
cost of GaN devices. GaN also com- single-step transformation across required. The duty cycle in Murata’s
petes against extremely good silicon an inductor. solution is typically three to four
MOSFET transistors today that deliv- This architecture f lips “on its times lower than a standard buck,
er very low FOMs and are combined head” the whole concept of power which also makes the buck stage
conversion. In a traditional single- much more suited to multiple-phase
stage buck or boost, the main switch- output, because more time is avail-
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 ing FETs are rated to hold off the able for control.

What is the result of all this com- now bringing to market products that new products have entered the mar-
plexity? It means dramatically small- are typically one-half the footprint ket in the last six months. Google
er i n d u c t o r s a re and two-thirds the has presented its switched-tank
needed. For exam- height. These prod- capacitive-based architecture for
ple, at 6 A, we need Murata confidently ucts demonst rate use in datacenters, which is avail-
3.2 × 2.5 × 1.2 mm expects capacitive- higher ef f icienc y able as an open source IP. Murata
chip i nductor s in (t y p i c a l l y 9 5 % ), con f idently ex pects capacitive -
based power
p l a c e of 4 × 4 × lower EMI (typical- based power conversion to become
2.5 mm wire-wound conversion to become ly 10–20 dB lower mainstrea m in low-voltage c o n -
inductors, thus halv- mainstream in low- noise floor across ver sion, a nd the compa ny has a
ing the space occu- voltage conversion. the entire frequency slew of new product introductions
pied by the induc- band), far lower in- based on this c o nc e p t p l a n n e d
tors, and with the put ripple (typically throughout 2020.
lower profile, making the whole pow- 5× reduction), and better transient
ertrain much easier to assemble in an performance. About the Author
advanced 3D semiconductor packag- While Murata was the first to Stephen J. Allen (sallen@psemi.com)
ing process. As a result, combining m a r k e t a soft-switching h y b r i d is the senior director of strategic
this unique circuit architecture with architecture, other companies are marketing at pSemi Corporation, a
in-house 3D packaging technology catching on to using capacitors for Murata company.
and passive components, Murata is power transformation. A number of

Society News
by Srinivas Bhaskar Karanki
India’s Kolkata Section and

Bhubaneswar Subsection Inaugurate the
IEEE PELS Joint Section Chapter
O
n 30 December 2019, the
School of Electrical Sciences,
IIT Bhubaneswar, Odisha,
India, inaugurated the IEEE Power
Electronics Society (PELS) Joint Sec-
tion Chapter of the Kolkata section
and the Bhubaneswar subsection. The
new Chapter was jointly inaugurated
by Prof. Sanjib Kumar Panda, an asso-
ciate professor and area director of
power and energy research at the
FIG 1 More than 40 students and several faculty members from the School of Electri-
Department of Electrical and Comput- cal Sciences, IIT Bhubaneswar, Odisha, India, participated in the inaugural ceremony
er Engineering, National University of of the IEEE PELS Joint Section Chapter of the Kolkata section and Bhubaneswar sub-
Singapore and Ex-Director General of section. (Source: Dr. Srinivas Bhaskar Karanki.)
the Central Power Research Institute,
Prof. A.K. Tripathi, in the presence of talk, Prof. Panda presented a com- for students and researchers working
faculty members from various noted parative analysis of a matrix-based in the power electronics area in the
institutions, such as the Kalinga Insti- converter with a traditional converter Bhubaneswar region.
tute of Industrial Technology, the Insti- by highlighting the benefits of the ma-
tute of Technical Education and trix converter in terms of efficiency About the Author
Research, and the Gandhi Institute of and power quality. In addition, he also Srinivas Bhaskar Karanki (skaran-
Technological Advancement. More discussed novel control and a modu- ki@iitbbs.ac.in) received his B.Tech.
than 40 students and several faculty lation algorithm to facilitate bidirec- degree from Acharya Nagarjuna Univer-
members from the School of Electri- tional power flow as well as to over- sity, Guntur, India, in 2007 and his Ph.D.
cal Sciences, IIT Bhubaneswar partici- come unbalanced conditions in the degree in electrical engineering from the
pated in this inaugural ceremony (Fig- electric grid. Indian Institute of Technology Madras,
ure 1). Dr. Srinivas Bhaskar Karanki, The inaugural ceremony was fol- Chennai, in 2012. From 2012 to 2014, he
chair of the joint Section Chapter, lowed by a miniworkshop on digital was a postdoctoral fellow at the Centre
gave a brief introduction of the activi- signal processing (DSP) using Texas for Urban Energy, Ryerson University,
ties planned for 2020. Instruments’ DSP board F28379D. It Toronto, Canada. He is presently work-
Prof. Panda delivered the techni- was conducted by Kedarnath Singam ing as an assistant professor at the
cal talk “High Performance and En- from Bhumitra Technologies. The School of Electrical Sciences, Indian
ergy Efficient Matrix Converter for workshop offered the participants an Institute of Technology Bhubaneswar.
Interfacing Battery Energy Storage opportunity to acquire hands-on ex- His current research interests include
System with Utility Grid.” During the perience with developing pulsewidth power electronic converters for renew-
modulated pulses. The aim of the IEEE able energy systems, power quality,
PELS Joint Section Chapter is to fa- energy storage, and power electronics
cilitate development and innovation in applications in power systems. He is a
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 the power electronics technology field Member of the IEEE.

by Ashok Bindra
Prestigious IEEE Medals Awarded

to PELS Executives
T
his year, the IEEE presented ing a sustainable society,” and Past Doncker was the PELS president dur-
two prestigious medals to PELS President Prof. Rik W. De ing the 2005–2006 term.
Power Electronics Society Doncker (Figure 2), director of RWTH
(PELS) executives. Current PELS Aachen University, Germany, received IEEE Edison Medal
President Prof. Frede Blaabjerg (Fig- the IEEE Medal in Power Engineering First awarded in 1909, the IEEE Edi-
ure 1), head of Aalborg University’s “for contributions to high-power and son Medal is the oldest and most
Center of Reliable Power Electronics, energy-conversion technologies.” coveted medal in the field of engi-
Denmark, received the IEEE Edison Both recipients are IEEE Fellows and neering in the United States, recog-
Medal “for contributions to and lead- have been involved in research and nizing meritorious accomplishments
ership in power electronics, develop- teaching power electronics engineer- in the fields of electronics and elec-
ing for more than 30 years. Prof. trical engineering.
Blaabjerg is the PELS president for Prof. Blaabjerg is believed to be the
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 the term 2019–2020, and Prof. De first power electronics professional
The higher standard of

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to receive the IEEE Edison for Flexible Electrical Networks
Medal. Over the years, Prof. at RWTH to research hybrid
Blaabjerg has been honored interconnected smart distribu-
with several scientific awards. tion grids for massive decen-
Key among them are the 2019 tralized and renewable power
Global Energy Prize at the generation systems.
Russian Energy Week Interna- He has been involved in
tional in Moscow, 2014 IEEE power electronics R&D for
William E. Newell Power Elec- more than 30 years, working
tronics Award, 2009 PELS Dis- diligently to realize increas-
tinguished Service Award, and ingly efficient and integrated
2007 Knight of the Order of power grids. As a result, his
FIG 1 IEEE Edison Medal FIG 2 IEEE Medal in Power
the Dannebrog by Her Majesty recipient Prof. Frede Engineering recipient Prof. novel power distribution and
Queen Margrethe II of Den- Blaabjerg. Rik W. De Doncker. conversion techniques have
mark. He has also coauthored enabled advances in power
several books on the subject quality, energy savings, the use
and published numerous papers in Reliable Power Electronics at Aalborg of renewable power sources, and the
conferences and journals. University, which is a strategic re- development of EVs. For example,
In the last three decades, contribu- search center bringing academia and in 1988, during his postdoctoral re-
tions made by Prof. Blaabjerg in ap- industry together to develop the next search at the University of Wisconsin,
plying power electronics technology generation of reliable power electron- Madison, he developed a bidirectional
for efficient control and conversion of ics technologies. dc–dc converter for the energy sup-
electric power have played a key role in ply systems of the NASA International
reliably connecting renewable energy IEEE Medal in Power Engineering Space Station. Now known as the du-
sources to the power grid, thus helping Established in 2008, and sponsored by al-active bridge converter, it is one of
to create a more sustainable society. the IEEE Industry Applications, Indus- the most efficient high-power isolated
Besides developing power converters trial Electronics, Power Electronics, dc–dc converters. A 7-MW version was
for wind turbine systems that can scale and Power & Energy Societies, the tested in a 5-kV multiterminal dc grid.
from megawatts to multimegawatts, he IEEE Medal in Power Engineering is Furthermore, his patented work on the
has also developed new topologies and presented to an individual who has auxiliary resonant commutated pole
interfacing techniques for photovoltaic made outstanding contributions to converter (ARCP) resulted in a high-
(PV) systems. In addition, his grid-inter- technology associated with the gener- power high-efficiency converter ca-
facing techniques for renewable energy ation, transmission, distribution, appli- pable of pulsewidth modulation. Such
systems, such as synchronization, smart cation, and utilization of electric multimegawatt ARCP converters have
monitoring, and the design and control power for the betterment of society. been used in uninterruptable power
of LCL filters, have been implemented Prof. De Doncker is also a recipient supplies, locomotive applications, and
around the world. For higher reliability of several other prestigious awards. ship propulsion systems. In 1993, he de-
in PV systems, wind farms, and trans- In 2013, he received the IEEE William veloped a medium-voltage static trans-
mission and distribution systems, he E. Newell Power Electronics Award, fer switch that was commissioned at
has also developed a power electronics- and in 2008, he received the IEEE PES more than 25 installations in the United
based active damper device to detect Nari Hingorani Custom Power Award. States. They are still operational today,
resonances in the grid that can damp In 2009, he led a VDE/ETG Task Force keeping power up during voltage sags.
the oscillations at a specific frequency. on electric vehicles (EVs). He has pub- His patented EV battery interface
His research has helped improve lished more than 250 papers and holds was licensed by General Electric and
the performance of adjustable-speed dozens of patents. is used in the majority of golf carts
drives while reducing noise and cost Prof. De Doncker is a member of and hybrid EVs worldwide, offering
and saving large amounts of energy. the German Academy of Science and improved efficiency with reduction in
He has developed several energy-op- Technology and the director of the Insti- hybrid vehicle battery size, weight, and
timal control techniques for induction tute for Power Electronics and Electrical cost. Additionally, for interoperability
motors, permanent-magnet motors, Drives at RWTH Aachen University. of EVs with 150-kW dc fast chargers,
and switched-reluctance motors used He is also the director of the E.ON En- he has developed modular multimo-
in commercial drives that have im- ergy Research Center of RWTH, where tor propulsion systems and modular
proved efficiency by 15–20% as com- he conducts research on medium-volt- smart batteries. This multimotor con-
pared to standard control methods. age grid-connected inverters and dc cept has also been implemented in the
Prof. Blaabjerg founded the Center of transformers. He founded the Center Audi Q6 eTron propulsion drive.

by Joao Onofre Pereira Pinto, Maeva Rênnua Silva Soares Araújo,
Mateus Pinheiro Dias, and Nayara Brandão de Freitas
Joint SPEC-COBEP 2019

Successfully Held in Brazil
T
he fifth IEEE annual South- and control of power converters, Electronics Association (SOBRAEP)
ern Power Electronics Con- motor drives, and power quality to meeting, IEEE Power Electronics So-
ference (SPEC) was held in modern applications like microgrids, ciety (PELS) events, a book release on
conjunction with the 15th Brazilian smart grids, wireless power transfer, power electronics, and a rap session
Power Electronics Conference electric vehicles, grid integration, (on complex and multidisciplinary re-
(COBEP) in Santos, São Paulo, Bra- and distributed control of power search involving power electronics),
zil, from 1 to 4 December (Figure 1). converters. To accommodate all of apart from the welcome reception and
It was a grand success. these topics, the technical program the official dinner.
The conference program varied included six tutorials, five plenaries, The program committee received
from traditional power electronics 34 oral, and three poster sessions. roughly 320 paper submissions from
topics such as the design, modeling, The conference program also offered five continents and 21 countries, out of
other opportunities for discussion which 250 papers were accepted and
and collaboration, such as three in- presented. The total number of attend-
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 dustrial sessions, the Brazilian Power ees was 325, with 245 professionals
WEMS Electronics
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Phone 310-644-0251 www.wems.com

FIG 1 The organizing committee of the joint IEEE SPEC-COBEP 2019.
and 80 students. The conference gen- peer reviews in fewer than 40 days. to earn a doctorate degree in power
der distribution was 85% male and SPEC-COBEP 2019 also provided an electronics. The technical session
15% female. opportunity to honor the pioneers of rooms had the names of Ivo Barbi
To handle this workload, organiz- power electronics in Brazil after their and Edson Watanabe, the supervi-
ers had huge support from 20 track half century of teaching and R&D. sors who had the highest number of
editors who managed 400 reviewers The plenary room was named af- masters and doctoral graduates in
to accomplish approximately 1,000 ter Edison da Silva, the first Brazilian power electronics in Brazil. The Wal-
dir Pó room honors the author of the
first master’s dissertation in power
electronics at the University of São
Paulo, while the Celso Bottura room
honors the author of the first doc-
toral thesis.
Activities sponsored by PELS were
also carried out during the joint con-
ference: the Women in Engineering
Breakfast, the Chapter Chair Forum,
and the Students and Young Profes-
sionals (YPs) Reception. During the
PELS Chapter Chairs Forum, 21 at-
tendees, mainly from South America,
had a chance to report on their Chap-
ters’ activities as well as to share their
plans for the future. Furthermore,
they suggested services and products
that could be developed by PELS for
its members. The meeting was also
open to PELS members interested in
FIG 2 More than 60 attendees participated in the PELS Students and YPs Reception at starting PELS Chapters or Student
IEEE SPEC-COBEP 2019. Branch Chapters.

The PELS Students and YP reception (Figure 2)
was a success during which more than 60 par-
ticipants networked while having typical Brazilian
snacks and drinks. The PELS Students and YPs
Reception was attended by great names in power
electronics. The night’s atmosphere was defined
by wonderful Brazilian regional music provided by
Sertanejo, Forró, and música popular brasileira.
The reception provided an informal atmosphere
for participants to interact and share experiences.
The activities and events offered at PELS-spon-
sored conferences have grown every year. Relaxing
environments and teeming interaction have been a
welcome experience for conference attendees.
Apart from the IEEE and SOBRAEP, the spon-
sors who made this event possible were the São
Paulo Research Foundation, PHB-Solar, Ohmini,
Typhoon-Hil, Supplier, Opal-RT, Semikron, Key-
sight, Wurth, WEG, Yokogawa, Tektronix, Precision
Solutions, Hioki, and Eldorado Institute.
We thank Prof. José Antenor Pomilio, general
chair, and Fernando Pinhabel Marafão, technical
chair, who successfully led both the organizing and
technical teams, resulting in a great conference.
by Ashok Bindra
The 12th IEEE

ECCE Unveils the
Latest in Energy
Conversion
Systems and
Technologies
S
ponsored by the IEEE Power Electronics
Society (PELS) and IEEE Industry Appli-
cations Society (IAS), the 12th IEEE Ener-
gy Conversion Congress and Exposition (ECCE)
2020 will be held at the TCF Center in Detroit,

Michigan, 11–15 October. The five- will offer special panel sessions, renewable energy generation, power
day conference will bring together interactive town hall sessions, and electronic intensive power systems,
nearly 2,000 practicing engineers, tutorials as well as plenary talks and dc technologies.
researchers, and other professionals and the exposition. More than 35 Together, the IEEE IAS and PELS
for interactive and multidisciplinary exhibitors will showcase state-of- have prov ided 30 st udent t ravel
discussions on the latest advances in the-art technologies, products, and grants (US$500 each) to financially
various areas related to energy con- solutions, creating a highly interac- support their student members to at-
version. Each year, this annual con- tive networking environment when tend ECCE 2020. To qualify for the
ference brings together a multidisci- combined with the poster sessions travel grant, you must be 1) a PELS
plinary group of researchers, engi- and student demonstrations on the or IAS student member, 2) a present-
neers, and scientists from all over same floor. ing author (oral or poster), 3) willing
the world to present and exchange The special sessions at ECCE to perform some volunteer duties
breakthrough ideas. 2020 are strongly oriented toward during the conference, and 4) fully
In his opening message, the ECCE the latest industrial interests. They registered for the conference. Award-
2020 General Chair Prof. Yunwei (Ryan) offer a way to explore and discover ees are selected by a PELS/IAS com-
Li of the University of Alberta, Cana- the latest technology trends and mittee based on the qualifications
da, invited the power electronics com- analysis techniques as well as the and financial need of the applicant.
munity to come and share insights most recent collaboration oppor- A check for US$500 will be issued to
into recent research and cutting-edge tunities between industry and aca- the awardees during the conference
technologies in electrical and electro- demia, whereas the tutorials pres- along with a W-9 (U.S. citizens or per-
mechanical energy conversion. With ent solutions to practical problems manent residents) or W-8 (others) tax
the lively presence of talented re- faced by practicing engineers. More form submission.
searchers, practicing engineers, and than 20 special sessions will be host- Because ECCE 2020 will colocate
other professionals, the atmosphere ed this year. Key topics include appli- with the IEEE IAS Annual Meeting,
will be enlightening and reinvigorat- cations of wide-bandgap power elec- attendees will be able to choose to
ing, he said. tronics, electric machines, drives register for only ECCE, or to jointly
In addition to peer-rev iewed and propulsion in electric vehicle, register for ECCE and the IAS Annual
technical presentations, ECCE 2020 aircra ft a nd aerospace systems, Meeting at a reduced combined rate.
by K. Biju
Successful Inaugural Edition

of IEEE PESGRE 2020
O
n 2–4 January 2020, the first
biennial IEEE International
Conference on Power Elec-
tronics, Smart Grid, and Renewable
Energy (PESGRE 2020) was held at
Le Meridien Kochi in Cochin, Kera-
la, India. Approximately 450 power
electronics and energy systems pro-
fessionals and researchers from
15 countries attended this confer-
ence for an exciting and productive
three days of nonstop activities,
FIG 1 Approximately 450 power electronics engineers representing 15 countries
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPEL.2020.2984404 attend PESGRE 2020 in Cochin, Kerala, India. (Source: IAS/IES/PELS Joint Chapter
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 Kerala; used with permission.)

Battery technology
stimulating discussions, and a prolific exchange
of ideas (Figure 1). The event was organized by calls for the
the IEEE Industry Applications Society/Indus-
trial Electronics Society/Power Electronics best protection
Society (IAS/IES/PELS) Joint Chapter Kerala
and cosponsored by the IAS/PELS and the IEEE there is
Kerala Section.
Emphasizing the theme “Power Electronics
and Renewable Energy for Sustainable Develop-
ment,” the conference focused on the challenges,
latest developments, and upcoming technologies
The conference
focused on the
challenges, latest
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inaugural address was delivered by Prof. Wang
Peng, Nanyang Technological University, Sin-
PELS-Anzeige-SIBA-16-8-17-86x124mm.indd 1 16.08.17 14:02
gapore (Figure 2).
Tape Wound Toroidal & Cut Cores
Initially, PESGRE 2020 received 483 submis-
sions from 19 countries that were subjected to That Outperform
a rigorous review process involving 38 tech- Transformer Laminations
nical program chairs and 386 reviewers. As a
result, 320 papers were accepted for camera-
ready submission. Special care was taken to
ensure a very good peer-review stage with
quality reviews for the benefit of the authors.
Subsequently, 301 camera-ready submissions
were received and, finally, 298 papers from 15
countries were presented during the confer-
ence. All presented papers from the conference
are eligible for submission to IEEE Transac-
The Most Advanced Grades Achieve Near-Perfect
tions on Industry Applications, subject to a
of Materials With Optimum Magnetic Circuits in:
further round of review. Core Performance Properties • Power/navigation systems for Aero-
The technical program consisted of four tuto- • Amorphous Alloys, Nickel-Iron, space, Defense & Electric Vehicles
rials, four plenary talks, two student forums, one Cobalt Alloys & Silicon Steel • Transformers and GFCI’s for
industry session, and 44 technical sessions. The • Shortest lead times for any type,
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magnetic materials • Power supplies for medical,
namely, Prof. Prasad Enjeti, Texas A&M Uni-
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FIG 2 Following tradition, Prof. Peng (second from right) lights a candle before the start of the conference. (Source: IAS/IES/PELS
Joint Chapter Kerala; used with permission.)
Chapel Hill; and Prof. Sheldon S. PESGRE 2020. They had a YP Pro-
Williamson, Ontario Tech Univer- The technical program gram student forum lead by Prof.
sity, Oshawa. consisted of four Pa nda, Prof. Sr ivastava, a nd Dr.
Plenary lectures were delivered tutorials, four plenary Harish S. Krishnamoorthy, Univer-
by Dr. Tomy Sebastian, Halla Me- sity of Houston; and Dr. Akshay
talks, two student
chat ron ics, Bay Cit y, M ich iga n; K. Rathore, Concordia University,
Prof. Wang Peng and Prof. Kashem forums, one industry Montréal, followed by a social gath-
Muttaqi, University of Wollongong, session, and 44 ering. Thirty of the YPs received
Australia; and Prof. Biplab Sik- technical sessions. a travel grant from the IAS to at-
dar, National University of Singa- tend PESGRE 2020. The conference
pore, on topics of interest, ranging proved to be a n excellent for um
from automotive technologies and There was a lot of interaction and for technical exchanges among re-
power system s a rch itect u res to exchange of information during searchers from academia, research
f uture smart grids and the power the technical program and the in- groups, a nd industr ies. The next
engineering community. The ses- dustry exhibit. edition, PESGRE 2022, will be held
s i o n s we r e chaired by active re- The young professionals (YPs) in Kovalam, Kerala, India on 2–5
searchers from reputed institutes. also had a variety of activities at January 2022.

by Ahteshamul Haque
IEEE PELS Jamia

Millia Islamia
University Student
Branch Chapter
New Delhi
Organizes a
Technical Talk
O
n 9 December 2019, the IEEE Power Elec-
tronics Society (PELS) Jamia Millia Islamia
(JMI) University Student Branch Chapter
(SBC), New Delhi, India, organized a technical talk
in collaboration with the IEEE Education Society
Delhi, India, Chapter and the IEEE PELS/Industrial
Electronics Society/Power and Energy Society
(PES)/Industry Application Society (IAS) joint Delhi
Chapter. The talk, “Hybrid Renewable Energy Stand-
alone Systems,” was delivered by Prof. Ambrish
Chandra, Department of Electrical Engineering
(DEE), École de Technologie Supérieure (ÉTS),
Montréal (Figure 1). Dr. Ahteshamul Haque, PELS
2021 IEEE 12th ENERGY CONVERSION CONGRESS AND
JMI SBC counselor and a Senior Member of the EXPOSITION - ASIA (IEEE ECCE ASIA 2021)
IEEE, welcomed Prof. Chandra and presented the Venue: Marina Bay Sands, Singapore | Dates: 24th–27th May 2021
audience with his biography and accomplishments. CALL FOR PAPERS: IEEE ECCE Asia is the Asia’s premier forum for
Prof. Chandra joined ÉTS in 1994 and is a coau- technical discussions on Power Electronics. Prospective authors are invited
thor of Power Quality: Problems and Mitigation to submit a digest, no longer than four (4) pages with single column. The
papers presented in the conference will be submitted for inclusion into the
Techniques. He is a Fellow of the IEEE and many IEEE Xplore digital library and 20% of the papers will also be
other organizations, including the Canadian Acad- recommended for further review for publication in IEEE IAS periodicals.
emy of Engineering, U.K. Institute of Engineer- The technical tracks include, but not limited to: Devices, Character-
ization and Packaging, Power electronics converters, Multi-modular
ing and Technology, and Engineering Institute of converters, Wireless power transfer, Lighting and Transportation
Canada, and he is registered as a Professional En- Electrification, Micro grid and smart grid applications, Energy storage
gineer in Quebec, Canada. Prof. Chandra is a Dis- systems, Motor drives and Actuators, Emerging applications of Power
Electronics, Condition Monitoring and Predictive Maintenance.
tinguished Lecturer of the IEEE PES and IAS and Deadline for digest submission: 30th Sept. 2020
a recipient of the IEEE Canada P. Ziogas Electric CALL FOR SPECIAL SESSION PROPOSALS: ECCE-Asia 2021 will
Power Award in 2018. also host special sessions to identify and focus on specific emerging fields
of research in power electronics and drives, as well as very specific topics
Before commencing his talk, Prof. Chandra
in power electronics to interdisciplinary areas to emerging trends. The
thanked Dr. Haque for the invitation. His speech Technical Committee invites experts to submit special session proposals to
highlighted the drawbacks of using diesel genera- techcommittee@ecceasia2021.com.
tors (DGs), including the high cost of electricity, air Deadline for special session proposals: 30th Sept. 2020
For further information, visit our website: www.ecceasia2021.com.
and noise pollution, losses in fuel efficiency, and
Address: E3-04-04, 2 Engineering Drive 3, NUS Singapore,
117581
Email: contactus@ecceasia.com; ecceasia2021@events-sp.com
consist of many elements, such as
photovoltaic panels, wind turbines,
DGs, energy storage systems, ac and
dc loads, dump loads, and so forth.
Most of these elements are connected
to the ac or dc bus via power elec-
tronic devices. During his talk, Prof.
Chandra identified many possible
hybrid renewable energy stand-alone
systems and discussed in detail the
control of some of them.
The lecture was attended by Prof.
Chandra’s wife, Prof. Anjali Agarwal,
FIG 1 Prof. Chandra (front row, center) with JMI faculty and students. (Source: Prof. who is a professor of electrical engi-
Ahteshamul Haque; used with permission.) neering at Concordia University, Mon-
tréal. The other attendees were Prof.
Z.A. Jaffery, head of the DEE, JMI;
maintenance expenses. To remedy most of the planet, but they are inter- Prof. Shabana Mehfuz, DEE, JMI;
those problems, he said, “it is better mittent in nature, especially wind and and Assistant Prof. Abrar Ahmad,
to generate power from cost-effective, solar power generation. This makes DEE, JMI; and other faculty members
environmentally friendly renewable their integration into the microgrid along with several Ph.D., B.Tech., and
energy sources (RESs), such as wind, with DGs difficult, especially if the lo- M.Tech. degree students. Seven pro-
solar, hydro, biomass, and so on.” cal grid is not connected to the main fessors attended with 30 students.
RESs are clean and available across one. Hybrid stand-alone systems

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Book Review
Power Electronics in Renewable

Energy Systems and Smart Grid:
Technology and Applications
L
ast year, Wiley–IEEE Press
published Power Electronics in This book is a valuable
Renewable Energy Systems and tool for graduate
Smart Grid: Technology and Applica-
researchers, practicing
tions by Prof. Bimal K. Bose, a pro-
fessor emeritus at the University of
engineers, and scien-
Tennessee, Knoxville, and an IEEE tists working in the
Life Fellow. The book was reviewed areas of renewable and
by Prof. Marian P. Kazmierkowski distributed energy
of the Warsaw University of Technol- systems.
ogy, Poland. This review was pub-
lished in the December 2019 issue
of IEEE Industrial Electronics Maga- be emphasized—among them, the
zine. An excerpt from that magazine most up-to-date positions. Also, a list
article follows. of abbreviations, biographies of con-
This eighth book in the series of tributors, and an index are included.
popular power electronics books This book is a valuable tool for
authored/edited by Prof. Bimal K. Bose graduate researchers, practicing
was released in June 2019 in the IEEE engineers, and scientists working in
Press Series on Power Engineering. the areas of renewable and distribut-
According to the author/editor, the idea ed energy systems. It provides the
for the book appeared after the publi- book. The authors of individual chap- needed technical background for
cation of the special issue of Proceed- ters systematically review the latest each subject. Therefore, it is also suit-
ings of the IEEE “Power Electronics in technologies and provide examples of able for senior undergraduate- and
Smart Grid and Renewable Energy Sys- applications to familiarize readers with master’s-level students of electrical
tems” in November 2017. Prof. Bose problems and solutions of modern engineering and power system facul-
managed to mobilize 19 outstanding power electronics in renewable energy ties interested in modern power elec-
specialists in the field of power elec- systems and intelligent networks. tronic energy systems.
tronics and energy systems from The excellent style of Prof. Bose is The complete review, which in -
around the world, who presented cur- apparent as each chapter begins with cludes chapter titles, author names,
rent issues in the 12 chapters of the a clear introduction and ends with a and references, is available in IEEE
constructive conclusion. Moreover, Xplore at https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/
each chapter contains an extensive stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 list of publications and what should 8939285.

What + If = IEEE
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Embrace the largest, global, technical community.
People Driving Technological Innovation.
ieee.org/membership #IEEEmember
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In Memoriam
Remembering Prof. Thomas A. Lipo:

A Giant in the Field of Electrical Machines,
Power Electronics, and Drives
O
n 8 May 2020, Emeritus Prof. sharpening his skills at GE for 10
Thomas A. Lipo passed away years, Tom made the transition to
in his Madison, Wisconsin, academia by joining the faculty at
home with his two daughters by his Purdue University in a group led by
side. Prof. Lipo was a pioneer in the Prof. Krause. In 1981, he returned to
field of electrical machines, power UW-Madison, where he joined Prof.
electronics, and machine drives, Don Novotny to cofound WEMPEC.
whose prolific 50-year career spanned By virtue of their combined efforts,
nearly the complete history of mod- WEMPEC grew into the highly suc-
ern solid-state adjustable-speed cessful university–industry partner-
motor drives to date. In his memori- ship that it is today, with more than
am column, Prof. Thomas M. Jahns, 80 company sponsors.
director, Wisconsin Electric Ma - For 28 years, Prof. Lipo codirected
chines and Power Electronics Con- WEMPEC as the Grainger Professor
sortium (WEMPEC) wrote “He was of Power Electronics and Electrical
particularly distinguished by his Machines, gaining international rec-
remarkable creativity with new elec- Prof. Thomas A. Lipo, 1938–2020. ognition as a leading authority in the
tric machine topologies, which fusion of electric machines, power
played a major role in the develop- engineering. He completed his Ph.D. electronics, and drive control algo-
ment of several important new class- degree in 1968 at the University of rithms. As a UW-Madison faculty
es of permanent magnet and reluc- Wisconsin-Madison (UW-Madison) member for 39 years, his contri-
tance-based machines widely used under the supervision of Prof. Paul butions in the field of electrical ma -
in commercial products today.” In K rause, with a young Prof. Don chinery and power electronics are
an email to IEEE Power Electronics Novotny as one of his Ph.D. commit- extensive. He supervised more than
Society (PELS) executives, Prof. Jahns tee members. The title of his thesis 120 graduate students, authored
said, “He was a giant in our field of was “Lyapunov Stability Analysis of a more than 700 technical papers and
electrical machines, power electron- Class of Variable Speed Drives,” a five books, and earned more than 50
ics, and drives who, together with topic that he continued to advance patents. His technical articles and
Emeritus Prof. Don Novotny, built throughout his illustrious career. books have collected more than
WEMPEC into a highly successful A fter obta ining his doctora l 50,000 citations in the international
university–industry consortium that degree, Tom joined General Elec- technical literature.
it remains today.” tric’s General Laboratory (later part Prof. Lipo was fond of internation-
Born on 1 February 1938 in Mil- of GE Corporate R&D) in Schenecta- al travel and making collaborations
waukee, Wisconsin, Tom attended dy, New York, where he worked with with academic colleagues around the
Marquette University, earning both an elite group of electrical engineers, world. He played a major role in pio-
B.S. and M.S. degrees in elect rical who together laid much of the foun- neering collaborations with faculty
dation for today’s field of solid-state members at academic institutions in
power electronics and adjustable- Japan during the 1970s and China
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 speed motor drives. In 1979, after during the 1980s that were mostly

closed to the West until that time. In Prof. Lipo was an IEEE Life Fel- Achievement Award of the IEEE
his memoriam column, Prof. Jahns low whose extraordinary academic Industry Applications Society (IAS),
said that these activities contributed achievements earned him numerous the 1995 IEEE Nikola Tesla Techni-
significantly to opening doors that prestigious awards including elec- cal Field Award, and the 1990 Wil-
strengthened international coopera- tion to the U.S. National Academy of liam E. Newell Award of the IEEE
tion in the power engineering field Engineering (2008), elected fellow of PELS. He was also actively involved
and brought large numbers of talent- the Royal Academy of Engineering in IEEE technical leadership activi-
ed engineers to study and launch in Great Britain in 2002, and the 2013 ties for many years including service
their professional careers in the U.S. National Academy of Inventors as president of the IEEE IAS in 1994.
United States. Plus, during his ca - (fellow). In 2014, he received the Prof. Lipo’s professional life and
reer, he held limited-time academic IEEE Medal in Power Engineering, accomplishments touched the lives of
appointments at several major uni- one of the IEEE’s highest honors many students, engineers, and facul-
versities outside the United States, presented to an individual who has ty colleagues. In Prof. Jahns’ words,
including Cambridge University in made outstanding contributions to “He leaves a remarkable legacy that
England and Hanyang University in technology and utilization of electric will live on, influencing the profes-
South Korea. For the past five years, power for the betterment of society. sional careers of power engineering
Prof. Lipo also held a research pro- Other similar awards included the students in WEMPEC and beyond for
fessor position at Florida State Uni- prestigious 2004 Hilldale Award at many generations to come.” Prof.
versity, Tallahassee. UW-Madison, the 1986 Outstanding Lipo will be missed dearly.
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Event Calendar
2020 25–27 October

24–26 June Redondo Beach, California, United States
Chicago, Illinois, United States IEEE Eighth Workshop on Wide Bandgap Power Devices
IEEE Transportation Electrification Conference and Expo (ITEC) and Applications (WiPDA)
24–26 June 25–28 October

Sorrento, Italy Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
International Symposium on Power Electronics, International Workshop on Power Supply on Chip (PwrSoC)
Electrical Drives, Automation, and Motion (SPEEDAM)
27–29 October
13–14 July Hail, Saudi Arabia
Manhattan, Kansas, United States Fifth International Conference on Power Electronics and Their
Applications (ICPEA)
IEEE Kansas Power and Energy Conference (KPEC)
3–6 September 4–6 November

Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Vienna, Austria
International Symposium on Industrial Electronics and
32nd International Symposium on Power Semiconductor
Applications (INDEL)
Devices and ICs (ISPSD)

Taichung City, Taiwan
Lyon cedex 06, France
International Symposium on Computer, Consumer,
22nd European Conference on Power Electronics and
and Control (IS3C)
Applications (EPE’20 ECCE Europe)

Seoul, South Korea
Suita, Japan
IEEE PELS Workshop on Emerging Technologies:
IEEE Workshop on Wide Bandgap Power Devices and
Wireless Power Transfer (WoW)
Applications in Asia (WiPDA Asia)

Seoul, South Korea
Nagpur, India
IEEE Wireless Power Transfer Conference (WPTC)
IEEE First International Conference on Smart Technologies for
Power, Energy, and Control (STPEC) 29 November–2 December
28 September–2 October Nanjing, China
Dubrovnik, Croatia IEEE Ninth International Power Electronics and Motion Control
Conference (IPEMC2020-ECCE Asia)
11th IEEE International Symposium on Power Electronics for
Distributed Generation Systems (PEDG) 1–3 December
4–7 October Nottingham, United Kingdom
St. Petersburg, Russia IET 10th International Conference on Power Electronics,
Machines, and Drives (PEMD)
XI International Conference on Electrical Power
Drive Systems (ICEPDS) 1–4 December
11–15 October Nadi, Fiji
Detroit, Michigan, United States IEEE Fifth Southern Power Electronics Conference (SPEC)
IEEE Energy Conversion Congress and Exposition (ECCE) 15–18 December
14–16 October Jaipur, India
Edmonton, Canada IEEE International Conference on Power Electronics, Drives,
and Energy Systems (PEDES)
IEEE Electric Power and Energy Conference (EPEC)
20–23 October
Izmir/Selcuk, Turkey
2021
Second Global Power, Energy, and Communication 21–25 March
Conference (GPECOM) Phoenix, Arizona, United States
IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and
Exposition (APEC)
7–9 April
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPEL.2020.2988315 Denver, Colorado, United States
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 2021 IEEE Green Technologies Conference (GreenTech)

8-11 December
2020
Denarau Island, Fiji
Important Dates
July 30, 2020
Digest submission
deadline
September 30, 2020
Notification of acceptance
October 20, 2020
Final paper submission
Call for Papers
General chair The 6th IEEE Southern Power Electronics Conference, SPEC 2020, offers an ideal opportunity for
PROF. A B M SHAWKAT ALI researchers, engineers, academics and students from all over the world to bring the latest
technological advances and applications in Power Electronics to the Southern Hemisphere, as
General co-chairs well as to network and promote the discipline.
PROF. UDAYA MADAWALA
PROF. MAHINDA VILATHGAMUWA Prominent researchers in this field will present keynote speeches during the four-day
programme that also features tutorials and technical sessions on theory, analysis, design, testing
and advances within the field of power electronics.
Hosted by
The conference venue, Sheraton Resort, is situated in the vibrant city of Denarau Island - the
commercial city of Fiji. Conference delegates can anticipate a beautiful ‘clean & green’
landscape and a social programme that includes exciting outdoor activities, scrumptious food
and fine Fijian hospitality. IEEE PELS student travel grants will be offered to selected students.
Papers presented at the conference will be included in the IEEEXplore Digital Library.
Topics of interest include but are not limited to:

• Power semiconductor devices and modules
• Magnetic materials, passive components EMC and EMI
• Wireless power transfer systems
• Power converter topologies and design
• Modelling, simulation and control of power electronics converters and motor drives
• Electrical machines and sensorless control
• Power electronics in renewable energy systems
• Power electronics in smart grid and utility applications
• Power quality, harmonics and reactive power compensation
• Monitoring, interfacing and control of energy storage systems
• Power electronics in lighting applications
• Power electronics in automotive, aerospace and marine applications
• Industrial, commercial and residential applications of power electronics
• Power electronics in mechatronics and robotics
• Education and training
• Emerging topics in power electronics
Prospective authors are invited to submit digests explaining the problem that will be
addressed by the paper, author’s contribution, how it differs from the closest existing
literature, major results that have been obtained and their significance.
Please check http://www.ieee-spec2020.org for detailed guidelines for submission.
www.ieee-spec2020.org
IEEE SPEC 2020  8-11 December 2020  Denarau Island, Fiji
White Hot (continued from page 104)
frequency transformer. The auxilia- During the 5-ms delay, the system +5-V output rectifier was a dual 60-V,
ry transformer output was rectified, ran its shutdown process, includ- 45-A Schottky diode, and the +12-V
filtered, and regulated by an LM7812 ing finishing writes to the hard output rectifier was a dual 150-V,
linear regulator to power the output- disk. Of course, the DCOK was im- 30-A fast-recovery silicon diode.
referenced control circuits. mediately deasserted if the output Both of these rectifiers were in TO-3
In addition to having the VT103 voltages were ever detected to be packages.
power supply design as a starting out of regulation. The toughest part of the specifica-
point, I was surrounded by a very My design for the H7862C started tion was the output noise. While nom-
experienced team of mentors and with a two-transistor forward con- inally specified at something like 5%
colleagues. Engineers, such as Jim verter. To try to minimize the size, I peak to peak, the real requirement
Gregorich, John Herrmann, Trey chose the unheard-of switching fre- was that a 5.25-in hard drive had to
Burns, and my supervisor, Dave Ber- quency of 50 kHz. The switching tran- work with the power from my supply.
tetti, were available for any ques- sistors were SGS Thomson BUW45 At DEC, no hard disk had been suc-
tions I had. Art Parker was a great NPN power bipolars in a TO-3 case. cessfully powered from a switch-
department manager. I also worked The high switching frequency was mode power supply. Disk drives,
with a great technician, Jim Gaudet, made possible by a base drive circuit which, until then, were washing-
from whom I probably learned more invented by Jim Gregorich. This drive machine-size cabinets, were powered
than he learned from me. DEC also circuit was a proportional drive (a from linear regulators operating from
had a great team of component engi- current transformer from the emitter either a mains frequency transformer
neers, including Rao Yedavalli (mag- to the base that forced the transistor or a mains frequency ferroresonant
netics), Charlie LaHaye (capacitors), to operate with a current gain of power supply. While investigating the
Roger LaChapelle four). To keep the VT103 power supply and related
(transistors), and transistor out of sat- designs, I noticed that the auxiliary
George Checkowski For an engineer right uration to speed up switch on the +12-V output created a
(ICs), who provided a the turn-off switch- large amount of noise. This was never
out college, I could not
great education on ing, a Baker clamp going to work with the hard drives. I
have asked for a
the practical aspects with two diodes in decided to go with a coupled induc-
of t hese compo - better group of folks series with the base tor on the +5- and +12-V outputs and
nents. For an engi- from whom to learn. was used. This as - to use a weighted-sum regulation
neer right out col- sured that the collec- scheme. The control IC was the Sili-
lege, I could not have tor–emitter voltage con General SG3527A.
asked for a better group of folks from was always greater than the base– As best I recall, I learned about
whom to learn the practical skills emitter voltage. This caused addi- the coupled inductor approach from a
and knowledge needed for power tional conduction loss but greatly paper written by someone at IBM
supply design. decreased the turn-off delay, time, circa 1977. I have, from time to time,
The model number of the Profes- and loss. One of Jim’s innovations sea rched to f i nd t h is reference
sional 350 power supply was H7862C. was to peak charge a capacitor from but have never found it. As for the
The power outputs were +5 V at 20 A, the +12-V output winding and use this weighted-sum regulation scheme, I
+12 V at 8 A, and –12 V at 1 A. The voltage and stored energy to drive the am pretty sure that I created that on
main output power connector was on turn-off of the main power transistor. my own. I later learned that this had
the rear of the power supply. The This created a consistently large turn- been done before, but I don’t recall
overall size was 4 in (10 cm) high, off current in the main power transis- ever seeing a reference. I stabilized
8.25 in (12 cm) wide, and 13 in (33 cm) tor base. the control by stabilizing each loop
front to back. The main power transformer and (+5 V and +12 V) independently. I wor-
There were two power status sig- output inductors were custom de - ried about this for many years, as it
nals: ACOK and DCOK. The power signs. I specified the required elec- “felt right” but I had not proved that
supply had to maintain the output trical and magnetic characteristics, this guara nteed stability. I was
voltages in regulation for a full but the parts themselves were de - quite relieved when I saw a paper
half cycle of ac power loss before signed by Rao Yedavalli, the magnet- at the 1986 Power Electronics Spe-
deasserting the ACOK signal. Once ics component engineer. As I recall, cialists Conference that proved that
the ACOK was deasserted, the out- these were or igina lly ma nu fac- the approach I had taken did guaran-
put voltages had to remain in regu- tured by Merrimack Magnetics, a tee stability.
lation for at least another 5 ms, and local company that supplied many of To prove this concept, Jim, my
then the DCOK was deasser ted. DEC’s power supply magnetics. The technician, and I created a basic

prototype. We laid out the printed run the fan at 120 V. I always think day. The +5-V output was connected
circuit board (PCB) using tape and that I should have applied for a through a resistor to a Zener diode
Mylar mats (my first PCB design). patent on that configuration, but I and the gate of a 2N6028 programma-
After we got the prototype working never did. ble unijunction transistor (PUT). The
well, we took it over to disk engineer- To precisely meet the timing and anode of the PUT was connected to
ing. We were able to power the hard behavior specification of the ACOK the +5-V output. If the +5-V output
drives with no more disk errors than and DCOK signals, I designed a logic (anode) increased to roughly a diode
with a linear power supply. This was circuit using 4000-series CMOS logic. drop above the Zener voltage (gate),
the first time at DEC that a hard drive The timing was controlled by, as I the PUT would trigger. The cathode
had been successfully powered by a recall, using 4047 one-shot multivi- of the PUT was connected to the gate
switching power supply. brators. The ACOK and DCOK signals of a C122F silicon controlled rectifier
The main system on–off power were open collector, open drain. To (SCR). When the PUT turned on, it
switch had to be on the front of the meet the requirement that these sig- drove current into the gate of the
system (Figure 1). The ac power inlet nals be pulled low when the power SCR, turning the SCR on.
and input voltage range select switch was off, J176 P-channel JFETs were
were on the rear (Figure 2). The fan, used as the output device.
which cooled not only the power sup- For current limiting, I sensed the
ply but the entire system, was on the +5- and +12-V output currents on the
side, venting out the side of the sys- high side. I used a precision divider to
tem enclosure. The usual approach at divide the signal down into the input
DEC was to use a double pole, double common-mode voltage range of the
throw switch for input voltage selec- LM339A comparators used to detect
tion. This switch also configured the an overcurrent. I initially did not have
primaries of the auxiliary supply the dividers and connected the com-
transformer in parallel for operation parator inputs directly to the output FIG 1 The front view of the H7862C.
from 120 V and in series for operation rails. This did not work. I still recall
from 240 V. The ac-powered fan was sitting at John Herrmann’s desk,
placed in parallel with one of the two where he opened up one of those
primaries of the auxiliary transform- massive, classic, blue-covered Na -
er. When operating from 240 V, the tional Semiconductor data books and
series-connected primaries acted as walked me through the internals of
an autotransformer to create 120 V the comparator, showing me the PNP
for the fans. transistor inputs and explaining the
For the H7862C, this arrange- input common voltage range specifi-
ment was going to create a wiring cations to me.
harness nightmare, with wires run- Output overvoltage protection
ning back and forth between the used the standard DEC design of the FIG 2 The rear view of the H7862C.
front and rear of the power supply. I
came up with an arrangement that
greatly simplified the input wiring
(Figure 3). The input voltage range
selector switch was, like in many
power supplies of the time, a single
pole, single throw switch that con-
nected the neutra l input to the
diode bridge to the center tap of the
main filter capacitors. I then con-
nected the auxiliary transformer
from that capacitor center tap to
the line input of the diode bridge.
This meant that the primary of the
auxiliary transformer always oper-
ated at 240 V (even if the input was
120 V). I had the primary of the aux-
iliary transformer center-tapped to
make an autotransformer to always FIG 3 The open view of the H7862C.

The anode of the C122F was con- the time. What was not typical was day. My supervisor, Dave Bertetti, gave
nected to the +12-V output. When the the cost. As I recall, the assembled me the project and let me run with it,
SCR fired, it would short circuit cost was approximately US$120, or backing my decisions and providing
(“crowbar”) the +12-V output. There US$0.6/W. This was a very low cost for coaching when needed. I also learned
was also a Schottky diode connected a power supply at the time. More typi- a lot being part of the design team for
from the +5-V output to the +12-V out- cal costs were in the US$2–5/W range. the whole system: mechanical, ther-
put such that, as the +12-V output DEC started manufacturing the mal, human factors, product safety,
voltage decreased below the +5-V out- H7862C power supply in the plant in electromagnetic interference, and sys-
put, the Schottky became forward Albuquerque, New Mexico. My tech- tem engineering, in general. I credit
biased, and the +5-V output was also nician, Jim, and I got to spend several this experience for laying a very solid
pulled down. Along the way, the high weeks in Albuquerque helping the foundation for the rest of my career. I
output current would trigger the new product introduction and pro- was very, very fortunate to have land-
overcurrent protection, stopping the duction test teams get production ed when and where I did, and I will be
power switching until the input running smoothly. Jim and I took forever grateful for that experience.
power was cycled. advantage of our time there by taking
There was no overtemperature the tram to the top of Sandia Peak, About the Author
protection in the power supply or in hiking in Bandelier National Monu- Robert V. White (bob.white@ieee
the system. I was once asked what ment, touring through Los Alamos .org) has more than 30 years of indus-
would happen if the fan failed. I said and the Jemez Canyon areas, and get- try experience as a power electronics
that the power supply would overheat, ting a fine introduction to the world- engineer. He has worked in product
either one of the main power transis- famous New Mexico chiles. Watching design, systems and applications engi-
tors or output diodes would fail, and the H7862C come off the end of the neering, and technology development.
the input circuit breaker would be production line, get packed, and be He has been an active volunteer with
tripped. This was acceptable because sent to the shipping dock gave me a the IEEE Power Electronics Society,
the fan was in the power supply. If the great feeling of “I designed that.” serving several years on the Adminis-
fan failed, the entire power supply Later, DEC transferred production trative Committee, two terms as tech-
would have to be replaced anyway to Phoenix, where we were able to nical vice president, and as a Chapter
Later, during system testing, there take day trips to the Grand Canyon chair. He earned a B.S.E.E. degree
was a fan failure. The power supply and the Sedona area. Production was from the Massachusetts Institute of
did not overheat, but the system did. later transferred to Hong Kong. Technology and an M.S.E.E. degree
The temperature in the system was Instead of sending Jim and me to from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.
so high that a floppy disk melted and Hong Kong, DEC sent the Hong Kong He is currently pursuing a Ph.D.
dripped into the floppy drive. The engineers to Maynard. This was a degree in power electronics at the
system folks were irate. It was the great experience for me in learning University of Colorado, Boulder. Pres-
only time I have been yelled at because how to work internationally. ently, he is the chief engineer of
my power supply did not fail. I do not think I could have asked for Embedded Power Labs, a power elec-
The overall design had an efficien- a better first job, first supervisor, or tronics consulting company. He is a
cy of roughly 75%, which was pretty first project. I established relation- Fellow of the IEEE.
typical for a switching power supply at ships and friendships that last to this
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6 Holy Stone Enterprise Co., Ltd. www.holystonecaps.com +1 951 696 4300
75 ICE Components, Inc. www.icecomponents.com/gate-drive-transformers
14, 87 ITG Electronics www.ITG-Electronics.com
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73 Plexim GmbH www.plexim.com
21 Power Integrations www.power.com
15 Powersim, Inc. psim.powersimtech.com/dsim-elec-2020.2
79 PREEN AC Power Corp. www.acpower.net +1 949 988 7799
77 RTDS Technologies, Inc. rtds.com
89 SIBA GmbH www.siba.de +49 23 06 70 01 0
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10 Triad Magnetics www.triadmagnetics.com +1 951 277 0757
85 WEMS Electronics www.wems.com +1 310 644 0251

White Hot
by Robert V. White
My First Power Supply Design
A
s this issue of IEEE Power think I have ever completely recreat- was taking a very personal interest in
Electronics Magazine goes to ed that design. I heard later that some the project.
press, it will be 40 years variation of it (with a bipolar transis- Although the system concept and
since I graduated from the Massa- tor instead of the MOSFET, for exam- power supply specifications were still
chusetts Institute of Technology with ple) eventually went to production, being developed when I joined DEC,
my B.S. degree in electrical engineer- but I did not see that and do not know it was known that there would be a
ing. This has me waxing a bit reflec- for sure. roughly 200-W power supply with
tive, so I thought I would share with My first real production design output voltages of +5, +12, and –12 V. I
you the story of my first power sup- started after I graduated. One week was given the schematic of the VT103
ply design. after graduation, I went to work in the power supply to study as a starting
Technically, my first power supply Small Systems and Terminals power place. The VT103 power supply had
design was for the General Electric supply group at the Digital Equipment been designed by Vatche Vorperian.
Power Systems business unit in Phil- Corporation (DEC) in Maynard, Mas- Yes, that Vatche Vorperian. After
adelphia. During the summer of 1979, sachusetts. The facility in Maynard, working at DEC, Vatche went to
between my junior and senior years, known as “the Mill,” was a complex of Caltech for his Ph.D. degree and then
I worked there as a summer engi- New England-style mill buildings later created the average pulsewidth-
neer. My task for the summer was to clustered around a millpond. Some of modulated switch model.
design a dc–dc converter that operat- the buildings dated back to the early The VT103 power supply was a
ed from –48 V and with ±15-V outputs 1800s. These buildings, which are fairly standard design for DEC’s small
rated at roughly 1 A. This was to be still there, have thick brick walls, systems. The power supply input
the power supply for a new line of well-worn wooden floors held up by was configured with a switch that
solid-state relays the power systems thick wooden columns, and massive changed the input rectifier and filter
business unit was developing for the wooden beams that could not be from a voltage doubler for operation
utility market. What I designed, but duplicated today. Every building has from 120 V to a full wave rectifier for
not did not know it at the time, was a lots of tall windows that let in the operation from 240 V. The main dc–dc
primary-side-regulated, peak-cur- maximum amount of natural light. It converter was a two-transistor for-
rent-mode-control flyback converter was a unique place to work, with a ward converter operating at roughly
operating in discontinuous conduc- “heart and soul and character” that 30 kHz. The control was closed
tion mode with a fixed off-time con- could never be matched by a modern around the +5-V output, and the con-
trol. The control IC was a single office building. trol IC was a Silicon General SG3524.
LM339 quad comparator driving a I was assigned to design the power The +12-V output was regulated with
Hitachi power MOSFET through a supply for the Professional 350, DEC’s an auxiliary switch transistor in
discrete totem pole. The prototype first desktop computer, which was series with the +12-V transformer sec-
worked well. I wish I had kept a copy using a processor chipset from the ondary winding. This switch was con-
of the schematic. I have, from time to PDP-11 computer family. This was a trolled by its own SG3524. The con-
time, made some sketches, but I don’t very high-priority and high-profile trols were referenced to the second-
project. The project was codenamed ary and powered by an auxiliary line
the “KO” project after Ken Olsen, the
Date of current version: 16 June 2020 founder and president of DEC, who (continued on page 100)

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