Abstract: Charging and powering consumer electronics and wireless microsensors are the focus of ardent research today. Volume, maximum power point, power-conversion efficiency, accuracy, and response time are critical in these applications because space, energy, and power are scarce commodities and emerging electronic loads are widely variable, dynamic, and sensitive to their supplies. Meeting operating requirements becomes increasingly more challenging when the input source is absent, as in the case of portable electronics that disconnect from their sources and ambient sources that cease to generate power. The research presented in this seminar investigates how one switched inductor can draw, transfer, and supply power to the load and battery and draw assistance from the battery when the input is absent or deficient. Controlling the switched inductors developed with this research so the output is well-regulated, the battery charges, and the system is at the maximum power point is also addressed with this work.

Bio: Gabriel A. Rincón-Mora is Motorola Solutions Foundation Professor at Georgia Tech, Fellow of the American National Academy of Inventors, Fellow of the IEEE, and Fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology. He has been with Georgia Tech since 2001 and was with Texas Instruments in 1994-2003. He was inducted into Georgia Tech's Council of Outstanding Young Engineering Alumni, named one of "The 100 Most Influential Hispanics" by Hispanic Business magazine, included in "List of Notable Venezuelan Americans" in Science, and elected IEEE Distinguished Lecturer (three two-year terms). He received the National Hispanic in Technology Award, Charles E. Perry Visionary Award, Three-Year Patent Award, Orgullo Hispano Award, Hispanic Heritage Award, State of California Commendation Certificate, and IEEE Service Award. His body of work includes 12 books, 8 handbooks, 4 book chapters, 44 patents, over 200 articles, 25 educational videos, over 26 commercial power-chip products released to production, and over 160 keynote addresses, distinguished lectures, and research seminars. URL: rincon-mora.gatech.edu.