CPES - Key Persons

Job Titles:

• Executive Assistant to Dr. Dushan Boroyevich

Job Titles:

• Research Assistant Professor

Education: Ph.D., Tsinghua University (2018) B.S., Tsinghua University (2013) Research Interests: Medium-voltage power conversion covering topology, auxiliary circuitry, insulation technique, advanced control and intelligent communication and control systems; Aircraft powertrain converters covering multi-phase drive, EMI mitigation, high-density electric drive train (EDT) integration, thermal management and high-altitude insulation technique Professional Experience: Research scientist: Center for Power Electronics Systems (CPES), Virginia Tech, VA, USA

Job Titles:

• Web Developer

Job Titles:

• Support Staff Member
• Procurement Officer

Job Titles:

• Assistant Professor ( ECE )

Christina DiMarino is an assistant professor in the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Virginia Tech, and faculty member in the Center for Power Electronics Systems (CPES). She received her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Virginia Tech in 2014 and 2018, respectively. She was a Webber Fellow from 2012 to 2015, and a Rolls-Royce Graduate Fellow from 2016 to 2017. She is located in the Virginia Tech Research Center (VTRC) in Arlington, VA, where she helped establish and manage two new CPES laboratories. From 2015 to 2018, she was the student membership chair for the IEEE Power Electronics Society (PELS). She is currently a Member-at-Large for the IEEE PELS Administrative Committee, Chair of the PELS Technical Committee 2 on Power Components, Integration, and Power ICs, an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, and is a member of the IEEE PELS Women in Engineering Committee. She is also on the advisory board for PCIM Europe, the advisor for the IEEE PELS Student Branch Chapter at Virginia Tech, and is a member of the ECE Diversity and Inclusion Committee at Virginia Tech. Research Interests: Power electronics packaging, high-density integration, medium-voltage power modules, wide-bandgap power semiconductors

Job Titles:

• Lab Operations Director

Job Titles:

• Support Staff Member
• Industry Program Director
• Program Director for Research and Innovation in Energy Systems

Job Titles:

• Assistant Professor ( ECE )

Dong Dong received his B.S. degree from Tsinghua University, Beijing, in 2007; M.S. and Ph.D degrees from Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, in 2009 and 2012, all in Electrical Engineering. From 2007 to 2012, he was a research assistant at Center for Power Electronics Systems (CPES). From 2012 to 2018, he was with Electric Power (EP) Organization at GE Global Research Center in Niskayuna, NY, developing power conversion and electric system technology for renewable energy system integration, electric grid, offshore and marine, oil and gas, aviation, navy, and industrial applications. In 2018, Dr. Dong returned to Virginia Tech, where he is currently assistant professor in The Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. His research interests include modeling, design, and digital control of power electronic system, low-voltage to medium-voltage SiC high-frequency power electronics, high-power resonant converter and high-frequency transformer, power conversion systems for grid, renewable energy integration, and transportation applications, and real-time hardware-in-loop simulation. During his tenure at GE, he has been involved with multiple large research and development programs and technology initiatives including subsea electrification, HVDC system, MVDC and high-power dc-dc converter for offshore marine vessels, hybrid energy storage module (HESM) for Navy, solar and energy storage system for utility and commercial applications and SiC power electronic building block (PEBB) technology for renewable energy integration. The developed PV micro-inverter technology was transferred to product commercialization. The developed subsea modular stacked dc (MSDC) technology was featured by SPE Journal of Petroleum Technology. He received several awards at GE including Gold Medallion Patent Award, Publication Award, and Technology Transition Award. Dr. Dong received 2nd Prize paper award from IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics in 2017. He currently holds 16 granted US patents and over 16 US patent applications. He was the vice chair of IEEE Industry Applications Society (IAS) Schenectady Region Chapter. Currently he serves as the associate editor of IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications.

Job Titles:

• IEEE Fellow
• Professor
• Professor ( ECE & MSE )

Dr. Guo-Quan (GQ) Lu is a professor jointly appointed between the Department of Materials Science and Engineering and the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Virginia Tech. He has a double-major BS degree in Physics and MSE from Carnegie-Mellon University and Ph.D. in Applied Physics/Materials Science from Harvard University. He worked at Alcoa Technical Center from 1990 to 1992 before joining Virginia Tech. Dr. Lu teaches fundamental courses in both MSE and ECE departments. In 1995, he won a Virginia Tech Sporn award for excellence in teaching of engineering subjects and a National Science Foundation CAREER award. Dr. Lu is an IEEE fellow for his development of nanomaterials and packaging technologies in integration and manufacturing of power electronics modules.

Job Titles:

• Assistant Professor
• Assistant Professor ( ECE )

Dr. Yuhao Zhang is an assistant professor at the Center for Power Electronics Systems (CPES), the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of Virginia Tech. Before joining Virginia Tech, he worked as a postdoctoral associate at the Microsystems Technologies Laboratories at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) from 2017 to 2018. He received his Ph. D. and S. M., both in electrical engineering from MIT in 2017 and 2013, respectively. Prior to joining MIT, he received his B. S. in physics from Peking University in 2011 with the highest honor. His research interest is at the intersection of power electronics, micro/nano-electronic devices, and advanced semiconductor materials. His multiple research work on power devices has been covered by the media globally over 50 times.

Job Titles:

• Director Emeritus
• IEEE Fellow
• University Distinguished Professor

Dushan Boroyevich was born in 1952 in Zagreb, Croatia, in what then used to be Yugoslavia. In the same country, he earned a Dipl. Ing. degree from the University of Belgrade in 1976 and an M.S. degree from the University of Novi Sad in 1982, both in electrical engineering. Between 1976 and 1982 Dushan was instructor at the Institute for Power and Electronic Engineering of the University of Novi Sad, helping to establish the electronics program. He then joined Virginia Tech for three and a half years for doctoral studies with General Electric Co. Fellowship. After obtaining his Ph.D. degree in 1986, he returned to the University of Novi Sad as an assistant professor, where he founded the power and industrial electronics research and education programs. In 1990, Dr. Boroyevich joined the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Virginia Tech, as associate professor, and in 1996 became associate director of Virginia Power Electronics Center that was founded by Prof. Fred Lee ten years earlier. In 1998, Fred and Dushan led the team of faculty from Virginia Tech, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, University of Puerto Rico-Mayaguez, and North Carolina A&T State University to win the US National Science Foundation funding for the first national engineering research center in the area of power electronics, the Center for Power Electronics Systems (CPES). With over 20 professors and over 200 students, working in partnership with more than 80 companies, CPES became the most renowned power electronics research and education center in the world. In addition to its alumni, probably the most enduring legacy of CPES was the paradigm shift in power electronics research towards higher levels of integration and modularization. Dr. Boroyevich is now also the CPES Deputy Director and Virginia Tech's Associate Vice President for Research and Innovation in Energy Systems. He has led numerous research projects in the areas of multi-phase power conversion, electronic power distribution systems, modeling and control, and multi-disciplinary design optimization. He developed a comprehensive geometric approach to modeling and control of high-frequency switching power converters that is widely used in the analysis, design, and control of multi-phase ac power conversion systems. He has graduated almost 50 Ph.D. and 50 M.S. students, and has co-authored with them over 1000 technical publications and 20 patents. Dr. Boroyevich is an IEEE Fellow, a recipient of the IEEE William E. Newell Power Electronics Technical Field Award and of IEEE Power Electronics Society Harry A. Owen Distinguished Service Award, and he was the President of the IEEE Power Electronics Society in 2011-2012. He is also the recipient of the Outstanding Achievement Award by the European Power Electronics Association and the award for Outstanding Achievements and Service to Profession by the European Power Electronics and Motion Control Council. Dr. Boroyevich is an Honorary Professor at Tsinghua University and at Xi'an Jiaotong University, and the Pao Yue-Kong Chair Professor at Zhejiang University in P.R. China, and the Kwoh-Ting Li Chair Professor at the National Cheng-Kung University in Taiwan. He received six prize paper awards, several awards for excellence in research and teaching at Virginia Tech and he is a member of the Virginia Tech College of Engineering Academy of Engineering Excellence. Dr. Boroyevich was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Engineering in 2014 for advancements in the control, modeling, and design of electronic power conversion for electric energy and transportation.

Job Titles:

• Director Emeritus
• University Distinguished Professor Emeritus

Fred C. Lee received his B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan in 1968, and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Duke University in 1972 and 1974, respectively. Dr. Lee is a University Distinguished Professor Emeritus and Founder and Director Emeritus of CPES, a preeminent academic center in power electronics research at Virginia Tech. As CPES Director, Dr. Lee leads a program that encompasses research, technology development, educational outreach, industry collaboration, and technology transfer. CPES focuses its research to meet industry needs and allows industry to profit from the Center's research and outputs. The CPES program enables its Principal Plus industry members to sponsor graduate fellowships and provides the opportunity to direct research in areas of mutual interest, as well as the ability to access intellectual properties generated collectively by all industry-funded fellowships on a royalty-free and non-exclusive basis. To date, more than 250 companies worldwide have benefited from the industry partnership program. The center has been cited by NSF as a model ERC for its industry collaboration and technology transfer, education, and outreach programs. Dr. Lee's research interests include high-frequency power conversion, magnetics and EMI, distributed power systems, renewable energy, power quality, high-density electronics packaging and integration, and modeling and control. Dr. Lee holds 105 U.S. patents, and has published 338 journal articles and 793 refereed technical papers. During his tenure at Virginia Tech, Dr. Lee has supervised to completion 88 Ph.D. and 94 Master's students. According to Microsoft H index, Dr. Lee is rated among the top three best cited authors for over 2.5 million engineering authors in the world.

Job Titles:

• Professor ( ECE )

Khai Ngo received the B.S. degree from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, in 1979, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, in 1980 and 1984, respectively, all in Electrical and Electronics Engineering. Upon completing education, he joined the General Electric Corporate Research and Development Center in Schenectady, New York, where he worked as a Member of the Technical Staff. In 1988, he joined the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida, where he served on the faculty of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. In 2006, he joined Virginia Tech as a professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department and as a member of the Center for Power Electronics Systems. At Virginia Tech, he pursues technologies for integration and packaging of power passive and active components to realize building blocks for power electronic systems. The integration strategy pursued divides the power electronic converter into three building blocks: Active, Passive, and Filter Integrated Power Electronics Modules (AIPEM, PIPEM, and FIPEM). Electro-magneto-thermal structures have been synthesized for realization of the functionalities expected from the structures. Materials and processes have been identified to verify the operation of the integrated structures. The structures, components, and interfaces have been subjected to thermal or power cycling, shearing, profiling, and spectroscopy analyses to assess their reliability. The AIPEM structure (e.g., an "embedded-power" module) contains the semiconductor devices, the associated ancillary functions (e.g., gate drives, sensing, and protection), and thermal management elements (e.g., heat spreader, heat sink, and micro-channel coolers). Interacting with the AIPEM to shape the conversion gain is the PIPEM (e.g., an integrated inductor/capacitor/transformer network) containing passive components designed to propagate energy at the switching frequency. The FIPEM (e.g., an integrated lossy transmission line for EMI filtering), on the other hand, contains passive components designed to attenuate at the switching frequency, or the frequencies beyond the useful power bandwidth. These building blocks can be integrated, with intelligence, into the energy-delivery path, starting at the load end and expanding to the network and the source end, to realize versatile, cost-effective, reliable, and sustainable energy systems.

Job Titles:

• Business Director
• Support Staff Member

Job Titles:

• Research Scientist

Job Titles:

• Software Engineer

Job Titles:

• Research Faculty

Job Titles:

• Support Staff Member
• Lab Assistant

Job Titles:

• Support Staff Member
• Adimistrative Assistant

Job Titles:

• Professor, Hugh P. and Ethel C. Kelly Chair

Richard Zhang received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from Tsinghua University in 1989 and 1993, respectively, and his Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from Virginia Tech in 1998. Dr. Zhang is the former Chief Technology Officer of GE's Grid Integration Solutions a $1B business focusing on High Voltage DC Transmission and Flexible AC Transmission Systems (HVDC & FACTS). Prior to joining Virginia Tech in 2021, Dr. Zhang was an Executive leader holding various technology and business leadership positions during his 22 years of career with GE in various GE organizations, such as GE Global Research Center, GE Oil & Gas, GE Power Conversion, GE Renewables, and GE Energy Connection. During 1998-2008, Dr. Zhang led power electronics research at GE Global Research Center serving all GE industrial businesses, including GE Oil & Gas, GE Aviation, GE Renewables, GE Power, GE Healthcare, GE Transportation, GE Lighting, GE Appliance, and GE Industrial Systems, as well as working with government agencies, such as DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), ONR (Office of Naval Research), and DOE (Department Energy), to advance the frontier of power electronics technologies. From 2008 to 2016, Dr. Zhang led power electronics, rotating machine, and automation technologies in GE Oil & Gas, GE Power Conversion, GE Renewables, GE Energy Connection, and GE Grid Integration Solutions, based in France, China, and the UK. He led diverse global teams with more than 600 people that span 22 sites in 9 different countries (US, Canada, UK, France, Germany, Finland, China, India, Brazil). Most recently, the advanced HVDC valve and HVDC control technology that Dr. Zhang led resulted in GE winning the 1.4 GW HVDC project in the North Sea in the UK the world's largest and longest distance offshore HVDC project for offshore wind farm tie-back. Richard served as Chairman of Industrial Advisory Board for CPES at Virginia Tech; served as Chairman, Board of Directors for Powerex - a power semiconductor and packaging company in the US; served as a steering committee member for SuperGrid Institute SAS in France; and served as an AdCom member for IEEE Power Electronics Society. Dr. Zhang has 47 journal and conference publications and invited talks, including 4 IEEE Transaction Award Papers. Dr. Zhang has over 105 global patents granted or pending in 42 patent families. Dr. Zhang is a Fellow of IEEE for his technical leadership in the development of high-power electronics. Research Interests: MVDC/HVDC and FACTS EV fast-charging stations Control and modeling for grid integration of renewables High power electronics for utility-scale energy storage and H2 production WBG device applications in MV/HV high power converters DC Circuit Breaker ML/AI application in high power electronics systems

Job Titles:

• Center Director
• Professor ( ECE )

Rolando Burgos (S'96 - M'03) was born in Concepcion, Chile, where he attended the University of Concepcion, earning his B.S. in Electronics Engineering in 1995 and a Professional Engineering degree in Electronics Engineering in 1997, graduating with honors. At the same institution he later earned his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering in 1999 and 2002 respectively. In 2002 he joined the Center for Power Electronics Systems (CPES) at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), in Blacksburg, VA, as Postdoctoral Fellow, where he became Research Scientist in 2003, and Research Assistant Professor in 2005. During this period he was primarily involved in the development and synthesis of high power density power electronics converters and distribution systems, co-advising several Ph.D. and Master students at CPES. In 2009 he became a Scientist with ABB Corporate Research, in Raleigh, NC, becoming Principal Scientist in 2010. This same year he was appointed Adjunct Associate Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at North Carolina State University (NCSU). While at ABB, he was involved in the development of multi-level converter platforms for medium voltage industrial and grid applications. In 2012 Dr. Burgos returned to Virginia Tech as Associate Professor and CPES faculty in The Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He earned an early-decision tenure in June 2017, and was promoted to Professor in June 2019. Since 2017 he was also a member of the CPES Executive Board. On July 1, 2021 he accepted the role of CPES Director. His research interests include multi-phase multi-level modular power conversion, grid power electronics applications, high power density power converters, the stability of ac and dc electronic power systems, hierarchical modeling, and control theory and applications. He has co-directed and participated in more than 80 sponsored research projects in this area, and coauthored over 460 peer-reviewed technical publications, including more than 80 journal articles; he has received seven prize paper awards. Dr. Burgos is the Chair of the technical committee on "Power and Control Core Technologies" of the IEEE Power Electronics Society, and associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, IEEE Journal of Emerging and Selected Topics in Power Electronics, and the IEEE Power Electronics Letters. He is a Member of the IEEE Power Electronics Society, Industry Applications Society, Industrial Electronics Society and the Power and Energy Society.

Job Titles:

• Support Staff Member
• Executive Assistant to Dr. Fred C. Lee

Job Titles:

• Research Faculty
• Visiting Scholar

Job Titles:

• Business Administrator
• Fiscal and Accounting Associate

Job Titles:

• Research Associate