Event

Speaker: Samantha Coday, Assistant Professor, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

 

Title: Enabling extreme and flexible ultra-dense and efficient future power conversion

 

Abstract: Driven by global energy challenges and the rapid adoption of renewable energy, modern power systems increasingly require efficient, high-density power conversion across wide operating ranges. This presentation explores how advancements in wide-bandgap semiconductors and capacitor-based energy processing can improve the size, efficiency, and performance of buck-boost power converters. By leveraging the high energy density of capacitors, these architectures reduce passive component size and switching stress while achieving high power density and efficiency. This presentation also presents extreme conversion-ratio converters based on capacitively isolated hybrid switched-capacitor architectures, enabling efficient high-step-up and high-step-down conversion for aircraft electrification and next-generation datacenter power delivery. Together, these technologies provide new pathways toward compact, scalable, and efficient power electronics for renewable energy systems, transportation, aerospace, and computing infrastructure.

 

Bio: Samantha Coday is an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Principal Investigator in the MIT Research Laboratory of Electronics. She received the M.S. degree and Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering and computer sciences in 2019 and 2023, respectively, from the University of California, Berkeley. Her research interests include ultra dense power converters enabling renewable energy integration, electric vehicle charging and data center power delivery. She focuses on the optimization, design and control of hybrid switched-capacitor converters. Sam has received the NSF CAREER and the ARPA-E IGNIITE awards.