Luminaries Special Sessions

Date: Tuesday, October 26, 2026

Event Time: 5:00 Pm – 7:00 PM

Prof. Seung-Ki Sul

Professor Emeritus
Seoul National University, Seoul

Seung-Ki Sul (S’78–M’87–SM’98–F’00) received the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea, in 1980, 1983, and 1986, respectively.

From 1986 to 1988, he was an Associate Researcher with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Madison, WI, USA. From 1988 to 1990, he was a Principal Research Engineer with LG Industrial Systems Company, South Korea. In 1991, he joined the faculty of the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Seoul National University, where he is currently a Professor Emeritus. His research interests include position-sensorless control of electrical machines, electric and hybrid vehicles, and ship drives.

Prof. Sul served as the Program Chair of the IEEE Power Electronics Specialists Conference in 2006 and the General Chair of the IEEE International Conference on Power Electronics and ECCE-Asia in 2011. From 2011 to 2014, he was the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Power Electronics, an SCIE-indexed journal published by the Korean Institute of Power Electronics (KIPE), Seoul, South Korea. He served as the President of KIPE in 2015.

He received the 2015 IEEE Transactions First and Second Prize Paper Awards on Industrial Applications simultaneously, followed by the 2016 Outstanding Achievement Award from the IEEE Industry Applications Society. He was also selected as the recipient of the 2017 William E. Newell Power Electronics Award sponsored by the IEEE Power Electronics Society.

With over 40 years of R&D experience, he has been involved in more than 150 industry- sponsored collaboration projects spanning elevator drives, steel mill plants, home appliances, power conditioning systems (PCS) for renewables, electric and hybrid vehicles, and ship propulsion. Having retired from Seoul National University in 2023, he currently serves as a technical advisor for the HD Hyundai Group (formerly Hyundai Heavy Industries), the world’s largest shipbuilder, where he focuses on the electrification of large vessels, including very large crude carriers (VLCCs) and liquefied natural gas carriers (LNGCs).

Dr. Deepak Divan
Founder & CTO

GridTran

Dr Deepak Divan is leading GridTran (www.gridtran.com), a new company within the Endeavour Energy group of companies, that is focused on the coming grid transformation, and is developing and building innovative high-power DC and AC energy infrastructure for large plants rated at 1-1,000MW and connecting to the grid at 13-35kV AC, to meet the demands of fast-growing applications such as AI datacenters, 24X7 off-grid power, generation/storage resources, electrified transportation and new industrial plants. Endeavour Energy (www.endeavourii.com) is a leading developer of global 
datacenters and related energy solutions. 
Dr. Divan also holds the position of Professor Emeritus at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, where he served as Professor and Founding Director for the Center of Distributed Energy. He is a leading researcher in the areas of power electronics, power systems, smart grids, and distributed control of power systems, with over 45 years of experience as an academic and entrepreneur. He has actively worked with DOE, ARPA-E, industry, electric utilities and startups to develop and commercialize advanced technologies in the power and energy area, such as transmission power flow control, grid forming inverters, soft switching converters, and solid- state transformers. Dr. Divan has started or provided the technology seed for several companies, including GridTran, GridBlock, GigaGrid, Innovolt, Soft Switching Technologies, Varentec & SmartvWires. He is coauthor of the book ‘Energy 2040 – Aligning Innovation, Economics and Decarbonization’, published by Springer in 2024, and recognized by Forbes magazine to be in the top 10 ‘must read’ books for 2025. 

Special Sessions

Special sessions are planned throughout the conference program. These 100 or 200 minute sessions are organized by industry experts in industry and academia and focus on specific trending topics. The format is often in a panel or individual presentation style with a moderator.

Monday, October 5th:

  • Joint Special Session on Grid-Forming Technologies
    • Songtao Huang, Research Fellow, Nanyang Technological
      University
    • Ziheng Xiao, Research Fellow, Nanyang Technological
      University
    • Jingyang Fang, Professor, Shandong University
    • Yi Tang, Associate Professor, Nanyang Technological University
    • Gab-Su Seo, Principal Engineer, National Laboratory of the
      Rockies
    • Hui Li, Professor, Florida State University
    • Ryan (Yunwei) Li, Professor, University of Alberta
    • Pedro Rodriguez, Professor, Luxembourg Institute of Science
      and Technology, Luxembourg
    • Xiongfei Wang, Professor, Tsinghua University, China
    • Rolando Burgos, Professor, Center for Power Electronics
      Systems (CPES). Virginia Tech, VA, US
    • Fred Wang, Professor, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA
    • Giovanni De Carne, Professor, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
  • Bidirectional Switches: From Devices to Topologies to Real-World Applications
    • Govind Chavan, Department Manager of Power Electronics
      ABB
    • Johann Kolar, Professor, ETH
    • Marco Liserre, Professor, University of Kiel
    • Michael Harrison, Power Electronics Architect, Enphase
    • Mehmet Ozbek, Principal Electronic Design Engineer, Tesla
    • Pengyu Fu, Research Scientist, Ohio State University
    • Thomas Jahns, Professor, University of Wisconsin-Madison
    • Victor Veliadis, Director/Professor, PowerAmerica Institute/North Carolina State University

Tuesday, October 6th:

  • Reliable Adoption of SiC/GaN Technologies: EMI, Circuit Design, Measurement, and Qualification
    • Yuchen He, Sr Engineer, Tesla
    • Shuo Wang, Professor and Michael Hsing Faculty Fellow,
      University of Florida
    • Jinyeong Moon, Associate Professor, Oregon State University
    • Yi Zhang, Assistant Professor, Hong Kong Polytechnic University
  • Sustainability and Circular Economy for Power Electronics, Electric Machines and Energy Storage Systems: Design, Materials, Manufacturing, and Lifecycle Strategies
    • Navid Zargari, Senior Researcher, Rockwell Automation
    • Ole Gerkensmeyer, Chief Strategy Officer, Nexperia
    • Shiori Idaka, Head of European Research Cooperation Centre, Mitsubishi Electric Europe
    • Abhijeet Mukkawar, Siemens
    • Pietro Cairoli, Head of ABB Corporate Research Center
    • Teng Long, Professor, University of Cambridge
    • Ariya Sangwongwanich, Associate professor, Aalborg University

Wednesday, October 7th:

  • Rare-Earth-Free or Reduced Electric Machines and Drives: Materials, Topologies, and Integrated Drive Systems
    • David Torrey, Senior Principal Engineer, GE Vernova
    • Akira Chiba, Professor, Institute of Science Tokyo
    • Ali Fatimi, Staff Researcher, General Motors
    • Helena Khazdozian, Senior Technology Manager, DOE
    • Yingjie Li, Staff Motor Design Engineer, Tesla
  • In Memory of Prof. Zhengming Zhao: Technical Legacy, Mentorship, and Community Impact in Power Electronics
    • Family representative of Prof. Zhengming Zhao Invited former student #1, Memorial speaker, Tsinghua
      University Invited collaborator #1, Memorial speaker, International
      power electronics community
  • Powering Next-Generation AI Data Centers: Challenges and Opportunities
    • Peter Barbosa, VP, R&D, Delta Eletronics Americas
    • Zerui Dong, Senior Engineer, OPAL-RT
    • Bo Chen, Senior Engineer, Commonwealth Edison,
      Chicagoland Utility
    • Xiongfei Wang, Professor, Tsinghua University
  • Hybrid Electric Aircraft Propulsion: Technology, Integration, and Certification Challenges
    • Todd Spierling, Principal Technical Fellow, Collins Aerospace
    • Rémi Robache, Program Manager, Pratt & Whitney
    • Maxfield Arnson, Research Assistant University of Michigan
    • Giusi Quartarone, Technical System Fellow, Collins Aerospace – Power and Control
    • Gaudy Bezos O’Connor, Project Manager, NASA
    • Yves Cousineau, Senior Certification Engineer, Transport Canada
  • Recent advancements in grid-forming technology for data centers and next-generation power systems
    • Philip Hart, Ph.D., Senior Power Systems Engineer, GE Vernova
      Advanced Research
    • Wei Du, Ph.D., Chief Engineer and Solar Subsector Manager,
      Pacific Northwest National Lab (PNNL), Interim Co-Director,
      PNNL-WSU Advanced Grid Institute (AGI), Research Associate Professor (joint appointment), Washington State University
      (WSU)
    • Xiaonan Lu, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Purdue University
    • Patrick Hart, Senior Controls Engineer, Mortenson
    • Siddharth Pant, Senior Program Management Engineer,
      GE Vernova Power Conversion and Storage
  • High-Performance Electrical Machines and Drives for Aerospace Applications Including Electrified Propulsion
    • Diederik Marius, Archer
      Agostino Russo, Boeing
    • Sara Roggia, magniX
      Christine Andrews, GE Aerospace
    • Aaron Anderson, NASA
    • Tao Yang, University of Nottingham, UK
  • HVDC Power Delivery for GW-Class AI Data-Centers: Challenges and Opportunities
    • TBD for all, Staff Engineer, Electric Transmission – Strategic
      Initiatives, Dominion Energy

Thursday, October 8th:

  • TC1 / TC2 / TC6 Special Session: Recent Advances in Piezoelectric-Based Power Conversion
    • Juan M. Rivas Davila, Associate Professor, Stanford University
    • Patrick Mercier, Professor and Vice Chair, University of
      California, San Diego
    • Ghislain Despesse, Research Director, CEA-Leti
    • Amanda Jackson, Ph.D. Candidate, Massachusetts Institute of
      Technology
  • From Variability to Consistency: Standardizing Cybersecurity for Virtual Power Plant and Aggregated DER Systems
    • Mark o Neil, Energy Hub
      Uri Sadot, SolarDefend
    • Carly Capiolla, NERC/E-ISAC
    • David Benton, Berkshire Hathway Energy
    • Sharvil Shetty, Tesla
    • John Franzino, GridSec
  • Converter-Rich DC Power Systems: From Conventional Microgrids to Electric Aircraft and Edge AI-Driven Systems
    • Dr. Pingyang Sun, Postdoctoral Fellow, School of Electrical
      Engineering & Telecommunications, UNSW Sydney, Australia
    • Fan Zhang, CEO, Shenzhen Power Bell Technology Ltd., Co,
      China
    • Dr. Hanwen Zhang, Postdoctoral Fellow, Affliations:
      Department of Electronics and Electrical Engineering,
      University of Bath, UK
  • (INDUSTRY/SS) Model-Based Design Workflows for Digital Power Converter Development
    • Ravindra Singh, Senior Principal for Distribution Automation,
      National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA)
    • Yashen Lin, Senior Engineer, Siemens Technology
    • Jin Tan, Principal Engineer, National Laboratories of the Rockies
    • Aditya Ashok, Director for Energy Systems Research, OPAL-RT
      Technologies
    • Mariko Shirazi, President’s Professor in Energy, University of Alaska Fairbank