Dr. Bryton Praslicka, a Texas A&M University alumnus and CEO of FluxWorks, led his team to victory at the Rice Business Plan Competition (RBPC), securing both the grand prize and the elevator pitch award.

FluxWorks, a firm specializing in the development and manufacture of magnetic gears and gear-integrated motors, stood out among competitors from esteemed institutions such as Rice, Brigham Young, Yale, MIT, and Harvard. Their innovative technology offers improved reliability and reduced maintenance costs compared to traditional mechanical gears, transforming the industry. The awards, totaling $360,000, serve as a testament to the potential impact of FluxWorks’ unique magnetic gear technology.  Read More…

Thomas Simms, an electrical engineering senior at Texas A&M University, developed leadership skills through the Engineering Honors Community of Scholars (ECOS).

In 2021, Simms pursued research on magnetic gears with Dr. Matthew Johnson, collaborating with doctoral student Bryton Praslicka. Their research in this emerging field led to innovative use of magnetic gears for wave energy converters. Their concept won the Water Power Technologies Office Bonus Prize at the Department of Energy’s EnergyTech UP competition, marking a significant achievement in their research journey.   Read More…

A team consisting of doctoral student Bryton Praslicka and senior Thomas Simms from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Texas A&M University was selected as Water Power Technologies Office Bonus Prize Winner at the Department of Energy’s (DOE) EnergyTech UP competition in March.

The team was awarded $25,000 for its innovative business plan to apply magnetic gears to wave energy converters through Praslicka’s startup company, FluxWorks LLC, which develops and manufactures magnetic gears for various applications. Read More…

Dorsa Talebi acquired a patent titled “An Asynchronously Excited Brushless Wound Field Synchronous Machine” on behalf of Dr. Toliyat, and was recognized at the Texas A&M technology commercialization ceremony for her contributions to innovation and research. Patent Link…

We’re honored to welcome Prof. David Perreault from MIT for a speech on high-frequency, high-density power conversion topologies and components at Texas A&M University, and a visit to the EMPE Lab.

Bryton Praslicka is the winner of Texas A&M University 2023 distinguished dissertation award in the Mathematics, Physical Sciences and Engineering category for his thesis, “Multi-physics Modeling and Optimization of Advanced Electric Machinery and Magnetic Gear Development.”  Read More…

Following the promising potential of the electric powertrain in re-inventing the arena of sustainable travel in phase one of the Texas A&M research project, graduate students and professors alike solidify their multidisciplinary team in entering phase two of the project backed by almost $5 million in funds. Read More…

Bryton Praslicka successfully defended his dissertation on January 25, 2023. His thesis was  titled “Multi-physics Modeling and Optimization of Advanced Electric Machinery and Magnetic Gear Development.”

Bryton Praslicka, president and CEO of FluxWorks, competed with other startups throughout Texas at TNVC to win the $35,000 first-place prize and several other sponsored prizes for its magnetic gear technology, which has improved reliability and reduced maintenance costs compared to its counterpart, the mechanical gear.   Read More…

The Texas A&M team is led by principal investigator Dr. Hamid Toliyat, Raytheon Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and head of the Advanced Electric Machines and Power Electronics Lab, and recent Texas A&M graduate Dr. Matthew Gardner ’19, who is an assistant professor at The University of Texas at Dallas. Read more…

Matthew Gardner successfully defended his dissertation on May 28, 2019. His thesis was  titled “Numerical and Experimental Analysis of Magnetic Gears.

Yichi Zhang successfully defended his thesis titled “Efficiency Improvements of an Axial Flux Permanent Magnet Motor” on May 6th, 2019.

Amir is going to join SynQor, Inc as a design engineer. EMPE lab wishes him best of luck with his professional career.

EMPE Lab congratulates Dr. Morya and wishes him best of luck with his professional career. Ajay will join Evelozcity as a power electronics engineer.

Professor Lipo visited EMPE Lab abd Texas A&M University as part of Distinguished Speaker Series on October 26th.

Prof. Lipo is a Life Fellow of IEEE and has received the Outstanding Achievement Award from the IEEE Industry Applications Society in 1986 for his work in motor drives, the William E. Newell Award of the IEEE Power Electronics Society in 1990 for contributions to power electronics, and the Nicola Tesla IEEE Field Award from the IEEE Power Engineering Society in 1995 for his work on electrical machinery. In 2002, Dr. Lipo was elected a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering(UK) (one of only about 25 US members) and in 2008 a Member of the National Academy of Engineering(USA). In 2014 he received the IEEE Medal in Power Engineering, the highest award presented by IEEE for research in the field of power engineering.

Amir successfully defended his dissertation on October 15, his thesis was  titled “Efficiency and Reliability Enhancement of Multiphase Synchronous Motor Drives”.

Ajay successfully defended his dissertation on October 10. He invented a system reconfiguration and control technique for a multiphase induction motor drive that can give up to 93% higher torque for acceleration. He designed and developed Silicon carbide inverter to drive a 6-phase motor. He also did a comprehensive study about the applications of wide bandgap devices in motor drives, opportunities, and typical issues and challenges.

EMPE Lab congratulates Dr. Morya and wishes him best of luck with his professional career

Our former PhD student Dr. Jae-Bum Park who is with Hyundai Motor Company revisited EMPE lab along other engineers from HMC. Jae-Bum is a Senior Research Engineer in HMC working on HEV/PHEV motor designs, as well as their e-4WD system.

“The Advanced Electrical Machines & Power Electronics Lab (EMPE) at Texas A&M University invented a configuration that places an axial flux machine in the bore of an axial flux magnetic gear to produce a very compact device capable of producing very high torques at low speeds.”

Read more.

Matthew is featured in student snapshot for his work on magnetic gears. Read more tx.ag/magneticgears

Gardner works in the Advanced Electrical Machines and Power Electronics Lab under Dr. Hamid Toliyat, Raytheon Professor. His work has been conducted largely in part with former doctoral student Dr. Matthew Johnson.

“Matthew has done a lot of work that has the possibility to significantly transform the field of electric machines,” Toliyat said.

“I am excited about the opportunity to make a disruptive change in the field of electric machines,” Gardner said. “Magnetic gears and magnetically geared machines offer the possibility to provide a significant, not just incremental, improvement in systems involving electric machines.”

Representatives from Hyundai Motor Company visited EMPE lab in regards to the joint research project between EMPE Lab and HMC.

Hussain successfully defended his PhD thesis in Spring 2017. He joins Kuwait University as an assistant professor. EMPE lab wishes him best of luck in his career.

Amir defended his Master’s thesis titled “Modeling and Experimental Verification of Adaptive 100% Stator Ground Fault Protection Schemes for Synchronous Generators” on May 3, 2017. He is currently continuing as PhD student at EMPE lab.

Hussain successfully defended his dissertation titled “Linear Permanent Magnet Machines for Oil Pumping Systems” on Jan 18th, 2017. He worked on the replacement of the sucker rod pumping system with a permanent magnet linear motor which drives the reciprocating pump directly. In this system, the motor drive is placed on the surface and connected through a long cable to the downhole linear motor which drives the reciprocating pump. This system is intended to extend the use of sucker rod pumping systems to off-shore applications and deviated wells.
He discussed the new system challenges such as the high temperature downhole and the long transmission cable and proposed a DC system where the inverter is integrated with the motor downhole while the rectifier remains on the surface. Moreover, he developed a sensorless algorithm to drive the PM motor without downhole position or current sensors.
Finally, he built a pump monitoring system to detect the common pump faults.

EMPE lab congratulates Dr. Hussain for his successful defense and wishes him best of luck with his professional career.

Abdulkadir successfully defended his dissertation, titled “A System-Based Modeling and Simulation of a Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) Electric Power Systems and Core Loss Analysis of Synchronous Generator and Induction Motor” on December 12^th, 2016. His research focused on harmonics effect on the core losses in machine caused by variable frequency drives. He made detailed analysis on different level of harmonics and showed their effect on the core losses. He also evaluated some experimental studies based on core losses in a synchronous generator.

Matthew successfully defended his dissertation, titled “Design and Analysis of Axial and Radial Flux Magnetic Gears and Magnetically Geared Machines,” on October 24^th, 2016.  His research focused on the design and analysis of magnetic gears and magnetically geared machines as potential compact, reliable, and cost-effective alternatives to mechanical gears and conventional direct drive machines for high torque, low speed applications.  During the course of his work, he developed an extensive MATLAB-based infrastructure for controlling various simulation models and analyzing their results.  He used these tools to investigate key magnetic gear design trends and construct multiple magnetic gear and magnetically geared machine prototypes, including a new patent pending compact axial flux magnetically geared machine.  He also created and evaluated generalized, parametric 2D and 3D magnetic equivalent circuit (MEC) magnetic gear models as significantly faster, but still extremely accurate alternatives to finite element analysis (FEA) models.

EMPE lab congratulates Dr. Johnson for his successful defense and wishes him best of luck with his professional career.

Prof. Toliyat and Matthew Gardner were awarded by Prof. Andy Knight Chair of the IEEE Industry Applications Society Electric Machines Technical Committee the 2016 Second Prize Paper Award for the following paper during ECCE 2016 in Milwaukee.

M. Johnson, M. Gardner, and H.A. Toliyat, “Analysis and Development of an Axial Flux Magnetically Geared Generator”, Proceedings of the ECCE’15, Montreal, Canada, Sept. 20-24, 2015.

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