Jianguo Zhu received his BE degree in 1982 from Jiangsu Institute of Technology, Jiangsu, China, ME degree in 1987 from Shanghai University of Technology, Shanghai, China, and PhD degree in 1995 from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Sydney, Australia, all in electrical engineering. He was appointed a lecturer at UTS in 1994, promoted to full professor in 2004, and Distinguished Professor of Electrical Engineering in 2017. At UTS, he has held various leadership positions, including Head of School for the School of Electrical, Mechanical, and Mechatronic Systems and Director of the Centre for Electrical Machines and Power Electronics. In 2018, he joined the School of Electrical and Information Engineering at the University of Sydney (USyd), Australia, as the Head of School and a full professor. After completing his term as Head of School in 2023, he is now a full professor at USyd. His research interests include computational electromagnetics, measurement and modelling of electromagnetic properties of materials, electrical machines and drives, power electronics, renewable energy systems, and smart grids.

Topic of the Speech: Recent Advances in Application Oriented Robust Design Optimization for High Quality Electrical Drive Systems

Abstract:The concept of application-oriented design optimization aims to develop electrical drive systems for best appliance performance. To achieve this goal, a system level holistic approach is developed to optimize the electrical machine topologies and materials as well as drive methods and control parameters. On the other hand, the system performance could be severely affected by various uncertainties, such as material diversities, manufacturing tolerances, and operational environment variations, resulting in high probability of failure. The six-sigma robust design approach is proposed to select the optimal design with the least sensitivity to these uncertainties for high quality mass production of electrical drive systems. This speech reports the recent advances in this field with various electrical drive examples.