Power Electronics and Drive Systems

Electrical machines need drive systems to be correctly controlled, if they need to be operated at variable speed. This can be achieved by modulating the energy flow to/from them. Power electronic devices operate as a switch, that is, in two possible states: on state and off state. As the complexity and the scale of electric‐ and electronic‐based power systems have been increasing, the need for computer‐aided design (CAD) tools of such systems has become rather essential. Modeling and simulating the operation of a circuit before the actual implementation can give essential knowledge about the circuit's behavior and greatly improve the design process, allowing to spot weaknesses and evaluate the performance under different conditions. The electrical circuit is not the only part to pay attention to when designing a real converter. In fact, a correct design must also take into account other physical domains, in particular, the thermal one.