PhD student Lina Huang from the Electronics Group at DTU Electrical Engineering is back from her external stay. From May to July 2014, Lina joined the Laboratory for Power Management and Integrated Switch-Mode Power Supplies at the University of Toronto, Canada, as a guest PhD student.
The laboratory carries out excellent research in the field of mixed-signal IC design for power electronics (power systems on chip), and digital and mixed-signal control of high-frequency converters - and the laboratory is headed by Professor Aleksandar Prodic.
Lina’s PhD project is supported by the Danish Advanced Technology Foundation in cooperation with Danfoss Polypower A/S and Heating Solutions Division of Danfoss A/S.
One goal of Lina’s project is to achieve highly efficient small volume high voltage DC-DC converter to drive DEAP (Dielectric Electro Active Polymer) actuator in heating valve application.
The knowledge concerning the digital control and IC design for power electronics is beneficial in greatly reducing the size of the control part in the high voltage converter.
In the Canadian laboratory, Lina designed and implemented a FPGA based digital control to replace the previous analog counterpart for the converter. The successful validation of employed digital control concept will benefit the future IC realization.
Lina writes “During my stay, through attending several seminars, I increasingly understood the details of the on-going projects as well as the research methodologies in the laboratory. The active discussions with the professor and colleagues inspired me a lot in achieving my goals”.