Matthew Mandel

I spend a lot of time thinking about the future of the grid, which I think will look increasingly decentralized and multi-directional. Power electronics, or devices that manipulate power with semiconductors, are a critical part of that story. They offer greater control and flexibility to facilitate the expanding variety of functionality needed at the grid’s edges. Professor Minjie Chen at Princeton gives a good overview of their potential in this article.

I’ve been trying to get smarter on power electronics from a technical perspective and have found these lectures from Tim McRae to be an excellent introduction. Even just working through the derivation of the buck converter gets you a feel for the field and a useful atomic concept that gets reapplied and built upon in all sorts of ways. I recommend checking them out if you’re interested in energy.