3. Power electronics tomorrow

Power electronics research is still very active. There are perhaps two reasons for this. Engineers are looking for more from semiconductor components, and the semiconductor industry is striving to increase component size and quality. Galium nitride (GaN) components, for example, are the subject of major research efforts, and companies interested in producing such components are appearing because the economic market is large. Tomorrow, it will be possible to draw energy directly from a very high-voltage source without a transformer. Industry is taking advantage of components with increased intelligence: a power module groups together the actual power components and their control; so making a power supply for a motor with speed variation has become a job of assembling blocks, like Lego!

The power electronics industry is under tremendous economic pressure to adopt...