Cambridge engineer awarded prestigious fellowship

Cambridge University's Dr Marina Antoniou has been appointed as a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellow for the next five years.

My long-term career aim is to establish a research lab and pursue energy-related research. The Fellowship will allow me to gain further research independence.
- Dr Marina Antoniou

The Fellowship, designed to help scientists and engineers at an early stage of their careers progress to permanent academic positions across the UK, will allow Dr Antoniou to pursue research into ‘silicon carbide power devices for smart grid systems’. The Fellowship is worth more than £610,000 with an additional research enhancement award of £110,000.

Dr Antoniou is a member of the Electronics, Power and Energy Conversion Group at the University of Cambridge. The research group looks at the design, development and optimisation of energy-efficient, reliable, and high voltage power semiconductor devices which are used in power electronic systems. Power electronic systems control and convert electrical energy, and have become the workhorse of many important applications in industry and in the home.

Dr Antoniou’s main research interests include the development of novel devices for addressing issues of energy efficiency, reliability, switching speed and cost-effectiveness of power semiconductor switches for medium and high voltage applications.

“I feel extremely honoured and excited to be awarded the Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellowship,” said Dr Antoniou, who studied Electrical and Information Engineering (BA, MEng) (Trinity College) in 2001-5.

“The development of energy-efficient power semiconductor devices directly translates into cost savings, energy-efficiency savings of up to 50%, and a boost to sustainable energy.

“Reducing energy usage is also seen as a key solution to the problem of reducing emissions. Therefore, the design and development of new, very promising, high performance devices utilising Wide Band Gap (WBG) materials such as silicon carbide would be extremely beneficial in the long-term for the industry and society. WBG-based power semiconductor devices are suitable for higher voltages, higher frequencies, and higher temperatures.

“My long-term career aim is to establish a research lab and pursue energy-related research. The Fellowship will allow me to gain further research independence.”

Reproduced courtesy of University of Cambridge, Department of Engineering



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