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Completed Events


February 15, 2021

Kansas State University IEEE Industry Application Society Student Chapter and the SPECS team hosted Dr. Ahmed Mohamed Sayed Ahmed to give an online speech entitled "Active Front End Power Converter for Regenerative Motor-Drive Systems Applications and Challenges." Regenerative active front end “AFE” based motor-drive systems are a very important segment in the drives market. The main advantages of this segment are that it does not require a braking resistor, it provides an input current with significantly reduced Total Harmonic Distortion “THD” , and a unity power factor. Moreover, AFE based motor-drive system can inject reactive power to the line if needed, thus providing power factor correction within the limits of thermal capacity of the drive. However, the AFE design as a critical part of the motor-drive system can be faced with several challenges such as LCL resonance condition, limited dynamic performance under certain grid conditions, and deteriorated performance if the system parameters are not well known. This talk focused on addressing these applications, and the corresponding challenges.

Dr. Sayed-Ahmed received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Marquette University, WI, USA in 2009. He is currently a principal engineer/ functional control architect at Rockwell Automation in the R&D Dept. (2009-present). His technical and academic record resulted in an honorable list of 23 peer reviewed journal and conference publications with over 230 citations, 25 granted patents and 25 pending patent applications. He is also the recipient of the IEEE Power and Energy Society Transaction Prize Paper award for the year of 2012. He is an IEEE senior member since 2011. Dr. Sayed-Ahmed is currently serving as a chapter chair for the IEEE Power Electronics Society, Milwaukee section.


January 21, 2021

Professor Josep Guerrero presented a webinar about microgrid concept. Contents of this talk included how we can produce, store, and consume energy locally as well as the relationship with our life philosophies concern, "To change outside world, we need to change from inside out." The speech presented some examples of how these technologies were impacting our daily lives with photovoltaic panels (PVs) in our rooftops, electrical vehicles in our garages, and energy storage systems in our houses. The way we are also conceiving energy generation outside, in the big grid, is now adopting many ideas from the microgrid concept, and more than ever, grid-forming concepts are starting to be proposed in large PV and windfarms – some examples of projects were explained in the meeting. The microgrid concept was shown in different applications of land based, maritime and space systems. Similarly, many examples and technologies regarding smart homes such as integrating the microgrid technology in our daily lives all together with IoT-enabled electronic devices, wearables, and e-health systems including smart devices to practice mindfulness were provided.

Dr. Guerrero received his Ph.D. degree in Power Electronics from the Technical University of Catalonia, Barcelona, Spain, in 2003. He is currently a Professor with the Department of Energy Technology at Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark. His current research interests include microgrids, power electronics, distributed energy-storage systems, the Internet of Things for ac/dc microgrids, maritime microgrids for electric powered ships, vessels, and ferries, etc. Dr. Guerrero is an Associate Editor for many prestigious IEEE journals, which are IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, and IEEE Industrial Electronics Magazine. Furthermore, he is an Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid. Dr. Guerrero established high academic success and contribution with his publications, cited over 60685 times according to Google Scholar.


October 21, 2019

Professor Thomas Overbye visited Power electronics and smart grid Lab at Kansas State University on October 21, 2019. His seminar is entitled "Enhancing Power System Innovation Through the Use of Highly Detailed Synthetic Electric Grids". This talk covers some of the recent developments in this exciting field, including the creation, validation and application of these grids. The talk also considers how synthetic grids can be used to demonstrate problems faced by industry, helping to develop new solutions to the large-scale, realistic problems faced by industry. Prof. Overbye is a TEES Eminent Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Texas A&M University. He is a member of US National Academy of Engineering.


April 11, 2019

Mr. Steven Schulz visited Power electronics and smart grid Lab at Kansas State University on April 11, 2019. His seminar is entitled "Power Electronics to Advance EVs through the Modern Era". This talk focused on electric vehicles, and discuss the common architecture and key functions which rely on power electronics. We will then discuss in deeper detail the key challenges and trends which are occurring in industry. Lastly, we will explore several opportunities for improvement which exist and could benefit from further investigation. Mr. Steven Schulz is director of Electric Power Conversion at Rivian Automotive.


March 27, 2019

Professor Haitham Abu-Rub visited Power electronics and smart grid Lab at Kansas State University on March 27, 2019.His seminar is entitled "Smart Grid and New Energy Paradigm". The talk will focus on the vision of creating new energy paradigm based on the smart grid principle. Enabling technologies, current status and the future Smart Energy System prospective will be discussed. Prof. Abu-Rub is professor and chair of ECE Department, Texas A&M University at Qatar. He is also the director of Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station (TEES) Smart Grid Center extension in Qatar.


March 27, 2019

Dr. Sertac Bayhan visited Power electronics and smart grid Lab at Kansas State University on March 27, 2019. His seminar is entitled "Microgrids: The Pathway to Smart and Cleaner Energy Future". This talk primarily focuses on design consideration of microgrids, including the current status and also future opportunities of renewables, energy storage, power electronics, microgrid control techniques, and the challenges of integrating microgrids into the electricity grid. Dr. Bayhan is an associate professor at Gazi University, Turkey. He is also working as scientist at Qatar Environment & Energy Institute (QEERI).


November 30, 2018

Professor Wei-Jen Lee visited Power electronics and smart grid Lab at Kansas State University as part of weekly seminar series organized by IEEE Industry Application Society (IAS) student branch at KSU. Prof. Lee is IAS distinguished lecturer, his seminar entitled "Seamless Integration of Renewable Energy". In 1986, he joined the University of Texas at Arlington, where he is currently a professor of the Electrical Engineering Department and the director of the Energy Systems Research Center.


March 09, 2018

Typhoon HIL Company visited Power electronics and smart grid Lab at Kansas State University, one-day training course on advanced hands-on modeling and test development of microgrids organized by Typhoon and Power electronics and smart grid Lab at Kansas State University campus, Manhattan, KS.