Thank you to everyone who participated in our recent AdCom election; voter turnout was the highest in recent history. Here are the six candidates that were elected to the DEIS Administrative Committee:
THOMAS ANDRITSCH (M’11) was born in Innsbruck, Austria in 1980. He received the Dipl.-Ing. Degree in Electrical Engineering from Graz University of Technology in 2006 and his Ph.D. degree in the same field from Delft University of Technology in 2010. He is currently working as a Lecturer at the University of Southampton with focus on advanced materials for high voltage applications and plant. He has extensive experience with preparation and testing of polymer-based electrical insulation materials, including nanodielectrics, electroactive polymers and syntactic foams, as well as liquid insulation systems and nanofluids. Thomas is currently the chair of the UK & Ireland IEEE DEIS Chapter. He is a member of the IEEE DEIS working group on nanodielectrics, developing recommended practices for nanocomposite synthesis and preparation, and was contributing to Cigre WG D1.40 on the subject of functional nanomaterials for the electrical power industry.
DAVIDE FABIANI (S’99-M’02-SM’17) received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering with honours in 1997 and 2002, respectively. Since 2014, he is Associate Professor at the Department of Electrical Electronics and Information Engineering of University of Bologna where he teaches the courses of “Innovative Electrical Technologies” and “Insulation Systems Design and Diagnosis”. Formerly, from 2005 to 2014 he was Assistant Professor at University of Bologna.
His fields of research are mainly related to: Development and characterization of nanostructured materials for applications in electrical and electronic apparatus, Investigation of HV apparatus diagnosis mainly through partial discharge measurements, Evaluation of the effect of non-sinusoidal waveforms on reliability of components and insulation systems (in particular, induction motors fed by power electronic converters) as well as the study of electrical conduction mechanisms and aging processed in high voltage insulation systems.
He was involved in several projects financed by public and private companies. He is author or co-author of about 180 papers, most of them published on the major international journals and conference proceedings. He is the Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation and IET High Voltage Journal as well as a reviewer for several International Journals.
He is a member of the IEEE DEIS since 1998 and Senior Member since 2017. He is a founder of the Research Group on Electrospinning (RGE) of University of Bologna. He is a member of the WG on Nanodieletctrics of IEEE DEIS and of two CIGRE working groups. He has been Technical Program Committee Chair of the IEEE CEIDP for 2014 and 2015. He was vice-chairman of the international conference IEEE ICSD 2013. He is currently a member of DEIS AdCom and Chair of the Meetings Committee since 2016.
ELIZABETH FOLEY (M’16) holds a B.S. in Polymer and Textile Chemistry from Clemson University, and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of South Carolina. She is currently employed at Zeus Industrial Products, Inc. as a Process Support Scientist working on a variety of projects, including insulated wire. She has been a member of IEEE Dielectrics and Insulation Society since 2015. In 2017, she was the International Chair for the Electrical Insulation Conference (EIC). In 2018, Elizabeth served as the International and Student Chair for EIC, and she is looking forward to continued involvement with DEIS.
AKIKO KUMADA (M’03) is currently Professor of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Systems at the University of Tokyo, where she has been a member of staff since 2003. Her areas of research include: Electro-optic sensors (Pockels sensor, Kerr sensor) and its application to field measurement, Discharge characteristics of CF3I (SF6 gas alternative) and its application to GIL, Electron density measurement in arc discharges by Shack-Hartmann wave-front sensor, Vacuum arc elucidation and improvement of withstanding voltage of vacuum circuit breaker, Insulation designing of stress grading system of high-voltage rotating machines, Treeing in silicone gel for IGBTs, treeing-visualization in epoxy resin filled with micrometer filler, and Quantum chemical computation approach of charge transfers in solid dielectrics.
Activities in scientific and technical committees include: Program Committee member (CMD 2010, CEIDP 2018), Associate Editor IEEE TDEI (2015-) and Secretary, Japanese national committee of CIGRE SC-D1.
AXEL MELLINGER (M’08-SM’09) obtained his physics Diploma and Ph.D. degrees at the Technical University in Munich, Germany, in 1992 and 1995, respectively. (His Ph.D. research was performed at the Max-Planck-Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics.) In 1996-1997 he held a two-year postdoctoral position at UC Berkeley’s Department of Chemistry. From 1998-2008 he was a senior scientist at the University of Potsdam, Germany, where he obtained the highest German university degree, the Habilitation, in September 2005. In August 2008 he joined Central Michigan University’s Department of Physics as Assistant Professor (2008-2014), and since 2014 as Associate Professor. His work focuses on optical and electrical properties of ferroelectrets and polymer micro- and nanocomposites, as well as multi-dimensional mapping of polarization and space charge distributions. He has authored/co-authored 47 papers in peer-reviewed journals. Dr. Mellinger is the current DEIS secretary. From 2010-2015, and again since 2017 he has been a board member of the IEEE Conference on Electrical Insulation and Dielectric Phenomena (CEIDP). He served as General Vice Chair of the 15th International Symposium on Electrets (ISE) in Baltimore, MD (2014). In August 2011 he was elected into the ISE Scientific Advisory Committee. From 2011-2015 he was an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation. Dr. Mellinger is a former scholar of the German Academic Scholarship Foundation. In the astronomical community he is known for his wide-field mosaic images of the night sky which are used in planetariums around the world.
HOWARD SEDDING (M’88-SM’15) graduated with a BSc in electrical and electronic engineering at the University of Strathclyde and then acquired MSc and PhD degrees. His PhD Thesis was on the degradation of epoxy mica insulation used in rotating machines.
Most of Dr. Sedding’s career was spent working at the Research Division of Ontario Hydro, later known as Kinectrics. Howard was involved in, or responsible for, numerous projects related to the specification, testing, monitoring and maintenance of solid, liquid and gaseous electrical insulation systems in a wide range of high voltage electrical equipment. At the conclusion of his career at Kinectrics he was manager of 40 specialists who provided testing and condition monitoring services to the electric utility industry. Currently, Howard is employed as an Insulation Engineer at Iris Power. He is an active member of numerous technical committees, and has contributed to many IEEE and IEC standards concerned with electrical insulation. Specifically, he is the Chair of the Canadian committee for IEC TC112 (Evaluation and qualification of electrical insulating materials and systems), the International Secretary of IEC TC42 (High voltage and high current test techniques) and is the Canadian representative for Cigre SC A1 (rotating machines). In 2006 he was the General Chair of the IEEE International Symposium on Electrical Insulation and was a technical co-chair of the Electrical Insulation conference in 1999 and 2001. From 1994-1999 he was a member of DEIS AdCom and is currently a member of AdCom having being elected to serve for the 2016-2018 term. Howard has authored and co-authored more than 150 technical papers.
