There was a seminar held by Dr Michael W. Degner from Ford Motor this Thusday on Feb 23, 2017. The seminar attracted the attendance of EE students who are interested in areas of EV.
Nowadays, the automotive industry is going through one of the largest transformations in its history. The simultaneous need for reducing CO2 emissions and the drive for new mobility solutions, including autonomous vehicles, is causing dramatic changes in the way vehicles are engineered and how customers will use them. Power electronics is one of the enablers for both CO2 reduction and new mobility solutions through vehicle electrification. The continuous push for reduced size, weight and cost of power electronic systems for use in these vehicle applications is causing a dramatic change in the way power electronic components and systems are engineered and integrated together.
Dr Degner started the seminar by reviewing some of these changes in power electronic systems and components driven by their application in automobiles, including a brief overview of where this evolution might be heading. In the second portion, he focused on the opportunities created by SiC semiconductors and the challenges that they must overcome to achieve widespread adoption in automotive applications.
Dr Michael W. Degner received the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in mechanical engineering from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in 1991, 1993, and 1998, respectively, with a focus on electric machines, power electronics, and control systems. In 1998, he joined the Ford Motor Company in Dearborn, MI, working in their Research and Advanced Engineering organization on the automotive application of electric machines and power electronics. He is currently the Senior Technical Leader of Electric Machine Drives and Manager of the Electric Machine Drive Systems Department of the Powertrain Research Laboratory, responsible for the global research and advanced engineering of electric machines, power electronics, and their control systems for hybrid, battery electric, and fuel cell vehicle applications. Dr. Degner has been granted more than 100 U.S. patents and has published more than 50 conference and refereed journal articles. He has also been the recipient of several IEEE Industry Applications Society Transactions and Conference paper awards.
