Author: Thane Himes

Integration and Operation of Microgrids in the Smart Grid

Speaker: Reza Iravani, Founder and Coordinator of the Centre for Applied Power Electronics and Professor, The Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Toronto

Date: December 5, 2011

Time: 1:10 p.m.

Location: Alliant Energy – Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall

Abstract: Environmental issues of central power plants, aging infrastructure, rapid technological developments of renewable resources, and the potential proliferation of plug-in electric vehicles have created the conditions for the utility power industry to consider the concept of “smart grid” to address the challenges of electric power systems. The smart grid integrates information and communication technologies, and advances control, protection, and power management strategies to improve grid performance, reduce address environmental impacts, respond to the rising electricity demand based on sustainability, and enable interactions among stakeholders.

This presentation provides a new perspective for migration from the conventional grid to the smart grid, and elaborates on the concepts, technologies, and R&D requirements, with an emphasis on the microgrid as a building block. This view of smart grid virtually divided the grid into multiple zones where the majority of zones are of “smart microgrid” type. The microgrids and the other zones within the smart grid can interact with each other and collectively respond to the operational needs of the encompassing smart grid. This talk provides definitions of smart grid, microgrid, and intelligent microgrid; elaborates on the technologies and concepts to realize such entities; describes operational bphilosophy, control, and energy management strategies for their realization; and highlights some of the barriers.

Speaker biography: Iravani received his Bachelor of Science degree in 1976 in Tehran, Iran, and worked as a consultant for the power utility industry until 1979. He received his master’s and PhD degrees from the University of Manitoba, Canada. Iravani currently serves as a professor in The Edward S. Rogers, Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Toronto, Canada. Iravani is the founder and coordinator of the Centre for Applied Power Electronics at the University of Toronto, through which he leads R&D activities for a group of 25 research engineers, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows, related to grid integration of wind and solar-photovoltaic power plants, grid integration of distributed energy resources, and control and operation of high-voltage direct-current converters.

Date: November 11, 2011

Time: 1 to 2 p.m.

Location: Alliant Energy/Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall

Details: The VRAC public tour offers participants a chance to learn about virtual reality (VR), the unique research facilities at Iowa State, how VRAC uses virtual reality as a research tool and a look at how computer graphics technology has improved in the past 25 years. In addition to the presentation, participants get to see several virtual reality applications that were developed at Iowa State. These demos typically include visiting the USS Ronald Reagan, a US Navy aircraft carrier, using VR for product conceptual design and exploring galaxies in the Virtual Universe.

The Variability Expeditions: Exploring the Software Stack for Underdesigned Computing Machines

Speaker: Rajesh K. Gupta, Professor and Qualcomm Endowed Chair in Embedded Microsystems, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of California, San Diego

Date: October 19, 2011

Time: 1:10 p.m.

Location: Alliant Energy – Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall

Abstract: Modern computing is ignorant of the variability in the behavior of underlying components from device to device, chip to chip, its wear over time, or the environment in which the computing system is placed. This is a growing problem, as microelectronic devices scale down to molecular assemblies. The ‘guardbands’ used to guarantee component behavior (for power, performance) have gone to ridiculous margins accounting for as much as two-thirds of the chip area to meet performance ‘specs’ and is already undermining the gains from continued device scaling. Changing the way software interacts with hardware offers the best hope to recover the advantages from process scaling. In this this talk, Gupta will describe his approach and progress in the Variability Expeditions project that fundamentally rethinks the rigid, deterministic hardware-software interface, to propose a new class of computing machines that rely on an opportunistic software stack to adapt to the conditions in an underdesigned hardware.

Speaker biography: Gupta is a professor and Qualcomm Endowed Chair in Embedded Microsystems in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). His research interests are in energy efficient systems. Gupta leads the Microelectronic Embedded Systems Lab and is head of the Embedded Systems Group at UCSD. His recent contributions include SystemC modeling and SPARK parallelizing high-level synthesis, both of which are publicly available and have been incorporated into industrial practice. Gupta has led or co-lead Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency-sponsored efforts under the Data Intensive Systems and Power Aware Computing and Communications programs. Gupta received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, a master’s degree in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of California, Berkeley, and a PhD in electrical engineering from Stanford University. Gupta is a Fellow of IEEE.

Seminar: Efficient Electromagnetic Approaches for Developing Effective Medium Model for Semiconductor Substrates

Speaker: Associate Professor Jiming Song

Date: October 17, 2011

Time: 1:10 to 2 p.m.

Location: 3043 ECpE Building Addition

Abstract: Current CMOS and RFCMOS processes require substrate backend dummification. Modeling such structures using existing full wave electromagnetic simulation is very memory-intensive and almost impossible even at small die sizes. We develop a faster and memory-efficient electromagnetic full wave simulation tool to model a silicon backend and a multilayer organic package substrate with an effective medium model. This effective model provides the key building block to study die/package interaction, components to components interaction as well as die to die interaction in multichip modules.

First, I will give an overview of the research in computational electromagnetics in my group. Then I will present two efficient approaches to model metal lines/patches in multilayered media as an effective medium. The integral equation approach is developed to analyze the wave propagation in periodic structures. The approach is capable of handling scattering from the array filled with different media in different layers. Combining the equivalence principle algorithm and connection scheme (EPACS), it can be avoided to find and evaluate the multilayered periodic Green’s functions. The spectral domain approach is applied to analyze shielded microstrip over lossy layered media and the equivalent model is developed to replace the layered media with a single layer. Several approaches have been developed to accelerate the summation of infinite series in the evaluation of the matrix elements.

Speaker bio: Associate Professor Jiming Song received his PhD degree in electrical engineering from Michigan State University in 1993. From 1993 to 2000, he worked as a postdoctoral research associate, a research scientist, and visiting assistant professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. From 1996 to 2000, he worked as a research scientist at SAIC-DEMACO. Dr. Song was the principal author of the Fast Illinois Solver Code (FISC).  He was a principal staff engineer/scientist at the Semiconductor Products Sector of Motorola in Tempe, Arizona before he joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Iowa State University as an assistant professor in 2002.

His research has dealt with modeling and simulations of interconnects on lossy silicon and RF components, the wave scattering using fast algorithms, the wave propagation in metamaterials, and transient electromagnetic field. Song received the NSF Career Award in 2006, and he is a senior member of IEEE.

The ECpE Distinguished Lecture on September 30, 2011 has been postponed due to health reasons.

Taming Heterogeneous Parallelism with Domain Specific Languages

Speaker: Kunle Olukotun, Director of the Pervasive Parallelism Laboratory and Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering and Department of Computer Science, Stanford University

Date: September 30, 2011

Time: 1:10 p.m.

Location: Alliant Energy – Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall

Abstract: Computing systems are becoming increasingly parallel and heterogeneous; however, exploiting the full capability of these architectures is complicated because it requires application code to be developed with multiple programming models. A much more productive single programming model approach to heterogeneous parallelism uses domain specific languages (DSLs). DSLs provide high-level abstractions, which improve programmer productivity and enable transformations to high performance parallel code. In this talk, Olukotun will discuss the DSL approach to heterogeneous parallelism, show example DSLs that provide both high productivity and performance, and describe Delite, a framework that simplifies the development of DSLs embedded in Scala.

Speaker biography: Olukotun is a professor of electrical engineering and computer science at Stanford University. He is best known as a pioneer in chip multiprocessor (CMP) design and the leader of the Stanford Hydra CMP research project. Olukotun founded Afara Websystems to develop high-throughput, low-power server systems with CMP technology. The Afara microprocessor, called Niagara, was acquired by Sun Microsystems. Niagara-derived processors now power all Oracle SPARC-based servers. Olukotun currently directs the Stanford Pervasive Parallelism Laboratory, which seeks to proliferate the use of heterogeneous parallelism in all application areas using Domain Specific Languages (DSLs). Olukotun is a Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery Fellow and IEEE. He received his PhD in computer engineering from the University of Michigan.

Seminar: Cyber-Physical Systems Security of Smart Grid

Speaker: Professor Manimaran Govindarasu

Date: September 19, 2011

Time: 1:10 to 2 p.m.

Location: 3043 ECpE Building Addition

Abstract: The electric power grid is a highly automated network that uses a variety of sensors, information/control systems, and communication networks (collectively known as SCADA, EMS, DMS) for the purpose of sensing, monitoring, protection, and control functions of the physical grid. The recent findings, as documented in federal reports and in the literature, indicate the growing threat of cyber-based attacks in numbers and sophistication on our nation’s electric grid. Therefore, cyber security of the power grid—encompassing attack prevention, detection, mitigation, and resilience—is among the most important research issues today.

This talk will provide a brief taxonomy of potential cyber attacks on the power grid, and present a cyber-physical systems framework for risk modeling and mitigation of cyber attacks on the power grid that accounts for dynamics of the physical system, as well as the operational aspects of the cyber-based control system. In particular, the talk will focus on risk modeling of intrusion-based attacks on the substation automation system and data integrity attacks on the wide-area control network. Finally, the talk will conclude with discussing the experience in building a SCADA cyber security testbed and its operational capabilities.

Speaker bio: Dr. Manimaran Govindarasu is a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Iowa State University. His research expertise is in the areas of cyber security, cyber security of smart grid, and real-time systems. He recently has developed a cyber security testbed for smart grid to conduct attack-defense evaluations and develop robust countermeasures against cyber attacks. He serves on the editorial board of IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, as the Chair of Cyber Security Task Force, and Vice-Chair of IEEE Power & Energy Society PSACE-CAMS Subcommittee. His research currently is funded by NSF and EPRC.

Date: September 16, 2011

Time: 1 to 2 p.m.

Location: Alliant Energy/Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall

Details: The VRAC public tour offers participants a chance to learn about virtual reality (VR), the unique research facilities at Iowa State, how VRAC uses virtual reality as a research tool and a look at how computer graphics technology has improved in the past 25 years. In addition to the presentation, participants get to see several virtual reality applications that were developed at Iowa State. These demos typically include visiting the USS Ronald Reagan, a US Navy aircraft carrier, using VR for product conceptual design and exploring galaxies in the Virtual Universe.

Tours are free, but reservations should be made online at www.vrac.iastate.edu/tours.php

Seminar: Interplay of Multiple Inputs in Controlling the Systems Biology of C. elegans

Speaker: Assistant Professor Santosh Pandey

Date: September 12, 2011

Time: 1:10 to 2 p.m.

Location: 3041/3043 ECpE Building Addition

Abstract: Systems Biology is an exciting stream in biology that aims to understand the complex interactions between individual biological components. The holistic approach of systems biology is particularly well-suited to study small animal models, promising a new perspective to important processes in living systems such as development, aging, and adaptability. In this respect, Caenorhabditis elegans is a powerful model organism in systems biology with a fully-sequenced genome and a close genetic similarity to humans. As such, C. elegans are routinely used to study human diseases, such as muscular dystrophy, Parkinson’s and Huntington’s diseases.

In this talk, I will present examples of the different C. elegans microchips being developed in our laboratory. These microchips allow us to control and manipulate the (chemical or electrical) microenvironment around the organism and characterize its behavioral responses. Compared to existing assays, our technique has significantly higher temporal and spatial resolution. An automated image-tracking program is developed to measure and extract relevant output parameters (e.g. body posture and movement) from each experiment. These experiments are run at real-time and with the flexibility of applying single or multiple inputs. An approach will be discussed to analyze and filter the large volume of experimental data, providing useful output information under different conditions. Our eventual goal is to model the ‘black-boxness’ of a behavioral trait and to predict how the genetic makeup produces distinct behavioral patterns in these organisms.

Speaker bio: Assistant Professor Santosh Pandey joined the ECpE department in August 2006. Prior to this, he graduated with a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Lehigh University. His research projects are aimed at developing micro-engineered platforms for manipulating and characterizing behavior of model organisms such as C. elegans, with implications to human diseases. His current research is funded by the National Science Foundation and is performed in the Bio/Nanoelectronics Laboratory of Coover Hall.

Low Frequency Noise in Magnetic Tunnel Junctions and GMR Devices

Speaker: E. Dan Dahlberg, Director of the Magnetic Microscopy Center, College of Science and Engineering Distinguished Professor, and Professor of Physics, University of Minnesota

Date: September 9, 2011

Time: 1:10 p.m.

Location: Alliant Energy – Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall

Abstract: The low frequency noise in magnetic tunnel junctions has been investigated. When one of the magnetic layers is switching, the magnetic aftereffect can alter the measured spectra and must be taken into account. When the magnetic aftereffect is taken into account, all spectra are consistent with 1/f noise and have magnitudes similar to those found in other magnetic states. Dahlberg and his team do not observe any magnetic contribution to the noise in any of the large area junctions (on the order of 100 microns on a side). At higher frequencies where the noise is frequency independent, the spectra are consistent with Johnson noise calculated for the junction resistance.

Speaker biography: Dahlberg is the director of the Magnetic Microscopy Center, a College of Science and Engineering Distinguished Professor and professor of physic at the University of Minnesota. His current research interests include the magnetic properties of magnetic thin films, multilayers, and tunnel junctions. His honors include an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow of the American Physical Society, George Taylor/ IT Alumni Society Award for Teaching, Distinguished Alumnus for the College of Science at the University of Texas at Arlington, University of Minnesota Outstanding Community Service Award, George Taylor Distinguished Service Award, and elected Distinguished Lecturer for Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Magnetics Society. Dahlberg received his bachelor’s and Master of Arts degrees in physics from the University of Texas at Arlington, and he received his Master of Science and PhD degrees in physics from UCLA.

An Investigation of Magnetic Reversal at Almost the Nanoscale

Speaker: E. Dan Dahlberg, Director of the Magnetic Microscopy Center, College of Science and Engineering Distinguished Professor, and Professor of Physics, University of Minnesota

Date: September 8, 2011

Time: 5:00 p.m.

Location: Sun Room, Memorial Union

Abstract: One of the current frontiers in magnetism is to understand the domain structure and the magnetization reversal in nanometer sized particles. Explorations at these length scales have been aided by the development of new magnetic imaging techniques, one of which is the magnetic force microscope (MFM), a variant of the atomic force microscope. Dahlberg and his team have utilized the high resolution MFM (30 nanometers) they developed to increase their fundamental understanding of magnetism on this length scale. Dahlberg will discuss the field induced magnetic reversal in stadia shaped particles on the order of hundreds of nanometers wide and about twice that in length. In general, for the small aspect ratio stadia (length to width ratio), the magnetization reverses by the formation of a single vortex and its propagation down the length of a stadium (when the fields are applied perpendicular to the long axis). The surprising discovery is the importance of virtual particles (vortex-antivortex pairs) creation and annihilation in the magnetic reversal in larger aspect ratio stadia.

Speaker biography: Dahlberg is the director of the Magnetic Microscopy Center, a College of Science and Engineering Distinguished Professor and professor of physic at the University of Minnesota. His current research interests include the magnetic properties of magnetic thin films, multilayers, and tunnel junctions. His honors include an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow of the American Physical Society, George Taylor/ IT Alumni Society Award for Teaching, Distinguished Alumnus for the College of Science at the University of Texas at Arlington, University of Minnesota Outstanding Community Service Award, George Taylor Distinguished Service Award, and elected Distinguished Lecturer for Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Magnetics Society. Dahlberg received his bachelor’s and Master of Arts degrees in physics from the University of Texas at Arlington, and he received his Master of Science and PhD degrees in physics from UCLA.

*Lecture cosponsored by Committee on Lectures (funded by GSB)