A power semiconductor module is basically a power circuit of different
materials assembled together using hybrid technology, such as semiconduc-
tor chip attachment, wire bonding, encapsulation, etc. The materials
involved cover a wide range from insulators, conductors, and semiconduc-
tors to organics and inorganics. Since these materials all behave differently
under various environmental, electrical, and thermal stresses, proper selec-
tion of these materials and the assembly processes are critical. In-depth
knowledge of the material properties and the processing techniques is there-
fore required to build a high-performance and highly reliable power module.
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With global drivers such as better energy
consumption, energy efficiency and reduction of
greenhouse gases, CO 2 emission reduction has become
key in every layer of the value chain. Power Electronics
has definitely a role to play in these thrilling challenges.
From converters down to compound semiconductors,
innovation is leading to breakthrough technologies. Wide
BandGap, Power Module Packaging, growth of Electric
Vehicle market will game change the overall power
electronic industry and supply chain. In this presentation
we will review power electronics trends, from
technologies to markets.
Today, electric power transmission systems should face many demanding chal-
lenges, which include balancing between reliability, economics, environmental,
and other social objectives to optimize the grid assets and satisfy the growing
electrical demand.
Moreover, the operational environment of transmission systems is becoming
increasingly rigorous due to continually evolving functions of interconnected
power networks from operation jurisdiction to control responsibly – coupled with
the rising demand and expectation for reliability.
Radio frequency identification (RFID) is a type of automatic identification systems
which has gained popularity in recent years for being fast and reliable in keeping
track of the individual objects. In RFID systems, contactless object identification
is achieved using radio signals without the need for physical contact as the case
with other existing identification technologies such as barcodes. Therefore, a huge
number of items can be identified in a short amount of time with high reliability
and low cost which makes the RFID technology very attractive for a wide range of
applications such as supply chain management, e-health, monitoring humans, pets,
animals, and many other objects, toll control, and electrical tagging. Furthermore,
RFID technology eliminates the human error and reduces the total cost of the
products.
With more than two billion terminals in commercial operation world-wide, wire-
less and mobile technologies have enabled a first wave of pervasive communication
systems and applications. Still, this is only the beginning as wireless technologies
such as RFID are currently contemplated with a deployment potential of tens of
billions of tags and a virtually unlimited application potential. A recent ITU report
depicts a scenario of “Internet of things” — a world in which billions of objects will
report their location, identity, and history over wireless connections.
Phenomenon is an overused and overloaded term, but somehow it seems appropriate for Arduino—an
endeavor that has caught the attention of an astonishingly wide range of people and provided
opportunities for those who might otherwise have never picked up a soldering iron or written a single
line of code. From dyed-in-the-wool hardware hackers to web page developers, robotics enthusiasts to
installation artists, textile students to musicians: all can be found in the Arduino community. The
versatility of the platform encompassing both hardware and software, combined with its inherent
openness, has captured the imagination of tens of thousands of developers.
The basic topic of this book is solving problems from system and control theory using
convex optimization. We show that a wide variety of problems arising in system
and control theory can be reduced to a handful of standard convex and quasiconvex
optimization problems that involve matrix inequalities. For a few special cases there
are “analytic solutions” to these problems, but our main point is that they can be
solved numerically in all cases. These standard problems can be solved in polynomial-
time (by, e.g., the ellipsoid algorithm of Shor, Nemirovskii, and Yudin), and so are
tractable, at least in a theoretical sense. Recently developed interior-point methods
for these standard problems have been found to be extremely efficient in practice.
Therefore, we consider the original problems from system and control theory as solved.
I am presenting this novel book on advances and trends in power electronics and motor
drives to the professional community with the expectation that it will be given the same
wide and enthusiastic acceptance by practicing engineers, R&D professionals, univer-
sity professors, and even graduate students that my other books in this area have. Unlike
the traditional books available in the area of power electronics, this book has a unique
presentation format that makes it convenient for group presentations that use Microsoft’s
PowerPoint software. In fact, a disk is included that has a PowerPoint file on it that is
ready for presentation with the core figures. Presentations can also be organized using
just selected portions of the book
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has undoubtedly been one of the most important buz-
zwords over the past years. The goal in AI is to design algorithms that transform com-
puters into “intelligent” agents. By intelligence here we do not necessarily mean an
extraordinary level of smartness shown by superhuman; it rather often involves very
basic problems that humans solve very frequently in their day-to-day life. This can
be as simple as recognizing faces in an image, driving a car, playing a board game, or
reading (and understanding) an article in a newspaper. The intelligent behaviour ex-
hibited by humans when “reading” is one of the main goals for a subfield of AI called
Natural Language Processing (NLP). Natural language 1 is one of the most complex
tools used by humans for a wide range of reasons, for instance to communicate with
others, to express thoughts, feelings and ideas, to ask questions, or to give instruc-
tions. Therefore, it is crucial for computers to possess the ability to use the same tool
in order to effectively interact with humans.
