Carlo Concari was born near Parma, Italy, in 1976. He received the M.S. degree in electronics engineering and the Ph.D. degree in information technology from the University of Parma, Italy, in 2002 and 2006, respectively. Since 2014 he is an Associate Professor with the Department of Information Engineering (now Engineering and Architecture) of the same university.
Carlo Concari coordinates a research group that includes 5-10 among researchers, postdoctoral fellows and PhD students. His research activity includes modeling and design of power converters and electric drives for various applications ranging from electric and hybrid-electric traction systems, to industrial automation and appliances, to grid-connected power converters for renewable energy conversion. He also researches fault diagnosis of electric motors and drives. Recently, he has been studying the application of wide-bandgap (SiC, GaN) power devices to power converters used in automotive, aerospace, and renewable energy applications. He advised more than 40 graduate students (MSc thesis), 12 PhD students, and 4 postdoctoral fellows.
He is the author or coauthor of more than 70 papers on top-tier peer-reviewed journals and conferences, collecting more than 500 citations with an h-index of 13 (Source: Scopus).
He participated in various nationally and internationally funded research projects:
- COFIN 2000 "Synchronous motor drives applied to high/efficiency electric City-Scooters", where he contributed to the study and implementation of optimal on-board energy management strategies and to the development of a DSP-based digital control for the specially-designed synchronous reluctance powertrain motor.
- PRIN 2003 "Innovative actuation and conversion in automotive", about the modeling and design of a brake-by-wire system for road vehicles.
- PRIN 2007 "Innovative solutions using synchronous machines in hybrid or electric vehicles for performance and efficiency enhancement", about optimization of energy management and motion control aboard hybrid/electric vehicles.
- EU Clean Sky Joint Undertaking, grant agreement no. 641496: ALEA - "Accelerated Life tests for Electrical drives in Aircraft" (2014-2016). Modeling and accelerated-lifetime testing of faults in electrical machines employed in aerospace, with particular focus on the wear endured when the electric machines are supplied with high frequency PWM driven by new generation wide-bandgap (WBG) power devices. High-frequency supply causes high dv/dt and di/dt values that can trigger partial discharge and other degradation phenomena.
- EU Clean Sky 2 Joint Undertaking, grant agreement no. 785513: RAISE - "Reliable Aircraft electrical Insulation System sElection" (2018). Natural continuation of previous ALEA project, study of the dependence of electrical machine vulnerability to partial discharge and related degradation phenomena on the type of winding.
Carlo Concari is or was the principal investigator of more than a dozen technology transfer contracts between the university and industrial partners both from the Emilia-Romagna region and outside, including:
- SPAL Automotive (Reggio Emilia), modeling and development of digital controls for automotive fan/heating/cooling systems;
- Casappa S.p.A. (Parma), development of high-reliability engine control units and hydraulic power control units with load sensing function for earth-moving machines;
- AIRO S.r.l. (Reggio Emilia), modeling and design of control units for force distribution aboard hydraulically and electrically powered aerial platforms;
- Decody S.r.l. (Treviso), modeling and development of novel high-dynamic DTC and predictive control algorithms for asynchronous and synchronous electrical machines used in appliances;
- DVG Automation S.p.A. (Piacenza), development of ultra-high-reliability and -resiliency control boards for fluid flow control in petrochemical industry;
- Dolsatech S.r.l. (Parma), modeling and development of the electrical powertrain for a light four-wheeled hybrid-electric vehicle for the urban environment;
- Fiama S.p.A. (Parma), modeling and development of a highly integrated all-in-one motor drive for industrial automation;
- Soulist S.r.l. (Parma), design and development of a miniature radio-operated remote actuator for on-stage audio mixers;
- Temec Drive S.r.l. (Reggio Emilia), development of innovative integrated motor drives for industry and home automation;
- University of Nottingham Ningbo China, modeling and development of a high-speed vector control algorithm for permanent-magnet-assisted synchronous-reluctance machines used in appliances.
- Startec S.r.l. (Parma), development of innovative motor drives and control algorithms.
- ZAPI S.p.A. (Reggio Emilia), implementation of common development tools for programming and managing firmware for powertrain electric motor drives and a teaching agreement for erogating a course on "Embedded System Design for Industrial Electronics".
He is a co-founder of two academic spin-off companies:
- Raw Power S.r.l., active since 2007 in the field of industrial research and application of static and dynamic energy conversion systems for the industrial, civil and automotive sectors, with a particular focus on innovative technologies for renewable energy conversion;
- eDriveLAB S.r.l. (2017), developer of innovative solutions for electric mobility for both on-road and off-road hybrid and electric vehicles.
He acted as technical track chair in several IEEE-sponsored international conferences and is a frequent reviewer for several top-rank journals and conferences of the IEEE, IET, and Elsevier.
