Kaushik of University of Houston

Autonomous electric vehicles (AEVs) are at the forefront of modern transportation, merging automation with sustainability to enhance efficiency, safety, and environmental benefits. However, these vehicles face significant challenges in propulsion systems, particularly in energy consumption, power efficiency, big data use, and computational processing demands. The extensive data generated by sensors, LiDAR, and AI-driven decision-making systems requires immense computational power, directly impacting battery performance and vehicle range, thus lead to higher emissions. One of the primary concerns is balancing the energy-intensive processing of autonomous functions with the vehicle's propulsion efficiency. High-performance electric drivetrains must integrate seamlessly with real-time AI computing while ensuring optimal battery longevity. Innovations in battery technology, power electronics, and electric machines and integrating with emerging technologies such as edge computing offer promising solutions to reduce latency and optimize power distribution. This presentation discusses the convergence of Electric, Autonomous, and Connected vehicles; amounts of data being used, power consumption problems in autonomous vehicles. The impact of the overall energy consumption on the CO2 emissions will also be discussed. The current challenges and future trends in enabling technologies for key propulsion system components, including batteries, power electronics, and electric motors will also be briefly presented.

Biography:

Kaushik Rajashekara (Fellow, IEEE) received the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India. In 1989, he joined the Delphi division of General Motors Corporation in Indianapolis, USA, as a Staff Project Engineer. In Delphi and General Motors, he held various lead technical and managerial positions, and was a Technical Fellow and the Chief Scientist for developing propulsion and power electronics systems for electric, hybrid, and fuel cell vehicle systems. In 2006, he joined Rolls-Royce Corporation, as a Chief Technologist for electric systems for electric and hybrid aircraft systems. In August 2012, he joined as a Distinguished Professor of Engineering with the University of Texas at Dallas, TX, USA. Since September 2016, he has been a Distinguished Professor of engineering in University of Houston, Houston, TX, USA. He has authored or coauthored over 300 papers in international journals and conferences, has 37 US and 15 foreign patents, and has written one book. He has over 250 invited presentations in international conferences and universities.  He has received a number of awards including the 2022 Global Energy Prize, 2021 IEEE Medal on Environment & Safety Technologies, and 2013 IEEE Richard Harold Kaufmann Award for his contributions to electrification of transportation and renewable energy.  He was elected as a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering in 2012, a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors in 2015, and an International Fellow of Indian (2013), Chinese (2021), and Japanese (2024) Academies of Engineering. His research interests include power/energy conversion, transportation electrification, renewable energy, and microgrid systems.