Powerconverters are an essential component of many electrical systems, from a smartphone or electric car to the electric grid. These devices flip current from AC to DC or DC to AC, modulate electric frequency, stabilize voltages, and generally make sure electricity is in a form usable by our electronics.
She dedicated the rest of her undergraduate career to power systems, electrical machines and power electronics. That interest led her to UW-Madison and the Wisconsin Electric Machines and Power Electronics Consortium (WEMPEC) research group for her graduate work. At UW-Madison, advised by ECE Professor and WEMPEC Director Giri Venkataramanan, Gupta began her research into power converters.
After earning her PhD, she spent a year at Ford Motor Company, working on electric vehicles as part of the research and advanced engineering group, designing electrified powertrain systems. In 2020, Gupta joined Portland State University in Oregon as an assistant professor.
PhD student Araz Saleki also will be joining Gupta at UW-Madison. Saleki is working on a National Science Foundation-funded project to design very-high-density and efficient power converters for integration of battery energy storage systems into the electric grid.
Chirag Gupta is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Prior to joining UW Madison, he worked as a device engineer in Maxim Integrated (now Analog Devices) on next-generation Silicon and GaN devices. He received a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) from the University of California at Santa Barbara in 2018. Before that, he obtained a B.Tech. in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and an M.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering and Computer Sciences from UC Santa Barbara in 2013 and 2016, respectively. He has been awarded the Outstanding Researcher Award at the University of California Santa Barbara by SSLEEC, UC Santa Barbara, thrice for his doctoral research (2016-2018) and Academic Excellence Award at IIT Kanpur (2012).
Chirag is broadly interested in wide-band-gap (GaN, SiC) and ultra-wide-band-gap (GaOx, C) semiconductor materials and devices. These semiconductors alongside Silicon will provide solutions to emerging technological challenges in the areas of power electronics, communications, bio-electronics, and quantum applications. Specifically, his research focuses on how these semiconductors can be utilized to develop next-generation electronics (transistors, diodes, etc.) and optoelectronics (LEDs, Lasers, etc.) devices. His research will involve an in-depth understanding of semiconductor device physics and fabrication technology applied to develop novel device designs, fabrication techniques, electrical and material characterization, data analysis and repeat!
"I did research and it helped me get accustomed to the way a team functions while pursuing research in a organization. Not just research itself, but interacting with my research colleagues at UB gave me a glimpse of culture and work environment in the US."
I was always very fascinated with so many embedded and wireless devices around me. Right from a mobile phone to a computer, majority of the consumer devices and automobiles have electronic operation which was very interesting to observe and then work with them. This fascination and an ambition to develop something innovative really turned into a serious thought which convinced me to study electrical engineering.
I was inclined towards concentrating on wireless system as my major during graduate studies. This was one the main reasons why I selected University at Buffalo (UB). University at Buffalo has really good and diverse courses in the wireless communication domain of Electrical Engineering department. What really struck me about this department is the long string of professors with great teaching and research experience in their domain. Moreover, the UB 2020 program really looked very impressive and gave me a sense that I really belong to UB and there will not be a better place for me than UB to start with my graduate studies.
My area of interest at UB was wireless communication and more so in Nano-networks operating at terahertz frequency band. I think UB has a tremendous team of professors and scholars in Wireless Communication department within EE. Additionally, there has been a great deal of research going on which is really the way to go if we were to make advancement in this field in future.
Apart from the array of points that I have mentioned about UB Electrical Engineering department regarding the professors and research, I think what makes UB EE special is the way faculty and staff made every effort to ensure that international student like me felt at home while pursuing my studies. Another notable fact about EE department is its brand new building (Barbara and Jack Davis Hall) with all modern facilities including state of the art research labs and various conference rooms to meet demands of small to large number of audiences.
I must say one of the best experiences I had during my time at UB has to be when I could defend my master thesis successfully in front of experienced professors of my department. Another proud moment which I will cherish for the rest of my life is during my convocation ceremony when I wore my academic regalia and received my graduate certificate from my departmental dean.
I currently reside in Michigan where I am a Research Engineer in the Advanced Multiplexing and Electrical Architecture group at Ford Motor Company. We develop high speed networking protocols for future concepts like autonomous cars. I definitely feel my time as a student at UB had a strong influence on me when I started working with Ford. Considering the fact that I did research, it helped me get accustomed to the way a team functions while pursuing research in a organization. Not just research itself, but interacting with my research colleagues at UB gave me a glimpse of culture and work environment in the US.
Manisha Gupta has received a PhD in Electrical Engineering from Yale University, a MS in Electrical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and an undergraduate degree from Mumbai University in India in Instrumentation Engineering. She has joined University of Alberta as a tenure transact professor in September 2014.
During her PhD, she developed the first novel tunable gallium arsenide deep center laser based on electrical injection. She has worked on wafer level 3D integration of chips during her MS, along with yield studies on damascene structures. As a postdoctoral fellow and research associate, she has conducted research in the area of optical materials including different growth techniques like Molecular Beam Epitaxy and Pulsed Laser deposition for growth and optimization of different materials for device applications. She has also worked on several laser applications based on light scattering for label free detection of cells and also for oil sands applications. She has industrial experience at the Alberta Center for Micro Nano Technology Products, where she worked as an optoelectronics product engineer, and at H2Gen Innovations where she worked as an Instrumentation engineer, in addition to research experience at a National Laboratory in India. In essence, her strengths are in optical materials, photonics, devices and sensing.
Currently, she specializes in biosensors for bio wearables and point of care sensing. In addition, she also conducts research in the area of 2D materials which includes density functional theory to understand the material properties, growth of large 2D materials for optical, electronic and biosensing applications.
Semiconductor device physics, device scaling trends, advanced MOSFET fabrication and the associated quantum mechanical framework in nanoscale systems. Semiconductor devices as a system of elemental components. Quantum phenomena in the evaluation of semiconductor devices. Impact of new materials such as high-k gate dielectrics, copper damascene processing and diffusion barriers on device performance. Choice of channel materials and strain condition for ultrascaled logic devices, RF and power electronic devices. Prerequisite: ECE 302 or E E 340. Credit may be obtained in only one of ECE 450 or E E 450.
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