Power Electronics Research Laboratory

This lab, directed by Dr. W. Shireen, supports graduate research work in Power Electronics that includes: advanced power converters, adjustable speed motor drives and power quality issues. The laboratory is equipped with test stations which include power converter modules along with associated instrumentation for experimental evaluation. State of the art Digital Signal Processor (DSP) based controllers and associated software are used to control the power converters.

  
   
 
     
   

Project Title: A reliable low cost Power Electronics interface for renewable energy systems using a single DSP controller.

Project Director: Dr. Wajiha Shireen

Project Sponsor: California Energy Commission

Project Description: Performance, efficiency and cost of the power converters and their associated control, are important considerations for the commercialization of renewable power sources. This project proposes a reliable and low cost power electronics interface for renewable energy systems using a single DSP controller. The proposed approach will achieve the following, (a) integrate the dc-dc converter control and inverter control by utilizing a single, low cost, fixed point Digital Signal Processor (DSP controller) (b) reduce the size of the dc-link capacitor by using a modified pulse width modulation (PWM) technique for inverter control (c) incorporate an unique feature in the dc-dc converter stage that will adequately control input ripple currents.
 
   

Project Title: Analysis and minimization of input ripple current in PWM inverters for designing reliable fuel cell systems.

Project Director: Dr. Wajiha Shireen

Project Sponsor: Seed funds from University of Houston.

Project Description: This project focuses on harmonic assessment of the inverter input current with balanced, unbalanced and nonlinear loads. The analytical method and proposed ripple minimization technique will enable fuel cell system designers to incorporate more reliable power electronics in their design by taking into account inverter ripple current due to modern nonlinear/unbalanced loads.

 
   

Project Title: An AC-DC-AC converter with smaller DC-link capacitor for space power distribution systems.

Project Director: Dr. Wajiha Shireen

Project Sponsor: Institute of Space Systems Operations (Current)

Project Description: This research project investigates a method to reduce the weight and improve the reliability of an AC-DC-AC converter used in a large number of power conditioning stages in a typical space power system.

 
   

Project Title: A DSP based power electronics interface for alternate/renewable energy systems.

Project Director: Dr. Wajiha Shireen

Project Sponsor: Department of Energy.

The objective of this research was to develop an utility interface (dc to ac converter) suitable to interconnect alternate/renewable energy sources to the utility system.