Returning to Normal with the Trusty Auto

Even the Twilight Zone couldn’t have predicted this – a global pandemic that turned bustling metropolises into ghost towns, caused whole populations to self-quarantine, and left a grim butcher bill with numbers eclipsing half-a-million worldwide.

Luckily, our industry appears to be one of the lucky ones, and despite a radical shift in work venues (and damage that we haven’t fully reckoned with), we seem to be in relatively good shape, and many companies have returned to normal, already.

Nowhere is this more evident than the humbling response to our July/August issue. The combination of a hot topic – Electric + Hybrid Vehicles – and a fervent effort by our industry friends has made for a jam-packed issue.

The first article I’d like to highlight deals with “Electrolytic Capacitor Considerations for Electric Vehicle Charging.”

One of the top concerns for the mass proliferation of EVs is the required infrastructure (check out our recent PSDcast, “Wireless Charging for Electric Vehicles”), and as Austin Finley with KEMET points out, this will raise demand for application-optimized components.

Austin demonstrates how electrolytic capacitors are used to stabilize the DC link in an on-board charger (OBC) application.

Our next article combines two of the hottest topics in the industry – electric vehicles and wide band-gap semiconductors. Gallium nitride (and silicon carbide) has taken over the industry, and as Alex Lidow, the CEO of Efficient Power Conversion, says, “The Smarter the Car, the More It Needs GaN.”

GaN technology is driving changes in at least four key automotive applications, including the “48V power distribution bus for mild hybrid cars, high-frequency DC-DC conversion for infotainment systems, brushless DC (BLDC) motors, and light detection and ranging (lidar) used for autonomous navigation,” Alex notes.

In these areas (and many others), “GaN technology thrives as it enables systems to be smaller, lighter, more efficient, and less costly to build.”

Finally, I’d like to discuss a piece that deals with a newly-ubiquitous feature – the automotive display. What’s that? Auto displays have relayed your MPH, RPM, and radio station for decades? True enough, but as Maxim's Szukang Hsien observes, “It’s becoming more common these days to step inside a vehicle and be greeted with a touchscreen that’s larger than a tablet computer.”

According to analysts, displays as large as 49 inches could enter cars by 2021, with 4K and 8K resolutions becoming standard, and as displays get bigger, it becomes even more critical to adhere to automotive functional safety standards.

Szukang concludes that “Automotive power ICs designed with capabilities like redundancy and diagnostic monitoring can go a long way to ensure that displays in critical applications like ADAS, center information displays, and side mirror replacements will work as intended.”

Enjoy the July/August content!

Best Regards,

Jason Lomberg

North American Editor, PSD