Modular Power Electronics for Electric Vehicles and Aviation Applications

The development of power electronics for mobile applications like electric vehicles and aircraft is driven by strict requirements in terms of component weight and system power density. Particularly in aviation applications, weight is decisive for the fuel consumption of the aircraft. Therefore, for the design of power electronic systems a holistic approach is necessary, which requires new procedures on component level as well as on controller level. One way to meet these requirements is the use of efficient power semiconductor devices like silicon carbide MOSFETs or gallium nitride HEMTs. This technology reduces losses and cooling efforts by efficient operation characteristics and optimizes the system with regard to the required filter components. The technical approaches presented in this paper will further help to design power electronic systems with high power density and low weight and ideally support fast switching power semiconductor devices.