Power Electronics-Emerging from Limbo [Conference Keynote Address]

Power electronics is a technology which is interstitial to all three of the major disciplines of electrical engineering: electronics, power, and control. Yet its rapidly expanding significance has not been widely recognized, and the historical parochialism of specialists within the technology has stifled communication and cooperation in solving increasingly challenging problems. This paper calls for an end to this parochialism, leading to the emergence of an important new discipline and profession.