Special Session on Multiphase Drives A Modern Trend in Power Electronics for Reliable Applications

In recent years, research in the area of multi-phase drives got momentum with advancement in digital signal processors and power electronic devices. Multiphase drives have gained special relevance in modern times for their use in applications where high overall system reliability and reduction in the total power perphase are required, such as electric vehiclesandtrains, all electric ship’spropulsion, more-electric aircrafts, or wind power generation systems. In this regard, the use of multi-phase drives seems advantageous as they have ahigher fault tolerant capability in comparison with classical three-phase drives. Multi-phase drives have also additional advantages, e.g. a lower content of higher spatial harmonics in the magnetic field along the air gap, a reduced level of noise, smaller parasitic torque, less harmonic content in the DC-link currents, improved power distribution and higher number of control degrees of freedom. To exploit all the above benefits, this special session aims at presenting the new research results concerning multi-phase machines and drives, multi-phase power converters and their applications.