IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 37, NO.
5, SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001
Performance Comparisons of Radial and Axial Field,
Permanent-Magnet, Brushless Machines
Kartik Sitapati and R. Krishnan, Fellow, IEEE
AbstractThe objective of this paper is to provide a compar-
ison between the traditional radial field permanent-magnet brush-
less machine and four unique configurations of axial field perma-
nent-magnet brushless dc machines. These consist of a single-gap
slotted axial field machine, a dual-gap slotted axial field machine,
a single-gap slotless axial field machine, and a dual-gap slotless
axial field machine. The comparison is done at five power levels
ranging from 0.25 to 10 kW. A rated speed of 2000 r/min is chosen
for the 0.25-kW designs while 1000 r/min is chosen for the rest of
the designs. The trends in performance and sizing for the different
power outputs are obtained to get an understanding of the capa-
bility of various machine configurations. The comparison consists
of required copper, steel, and magnet weights, copper and iron loss,
moment of inertia, torque per unit moment of inertia, power per
unit active weight, and power per unit active volume for five dif-
ferent power levels. For a given application, the results provide an
indication of the machine best suited with respect to performance
and size. The basis for the comparison is described with details on
the design procedure.
Index TermsAxial field, brushless, dual gap, loss, moment of
inertia, permanent magnet, power per unit active volume, power
per unit active weight, radial field, single gap, slotless, slotted,
torque per unit moment of inertia, weight.
NOMENCLATURE
Slot fill, %.
Steel flux density, T.
Air-gap flux density, T.
Phase resistance, .
AWG Number of strands, wire gauge.
Magnet thickness, mm.
Stator teeth iron loss, W.
Stator yoke iron loss, W.
Stator teeth iron loss at 60 Hz, W/kg.
Stator yoke iron loss at 60 Hz, W/kg.
Electrical speed of rotor, Hz.
Peak tooth flux density, T.
Peak yoke flux density, T.
Total stator teeth weight, kg.
Total stator yoke weight, kg.
Paper IPCSD 01023, presented at the 2000 Industry Applications Society
Annual Meeting, Rome, Italy, October 812, and approved for publication in
the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS by the Electric Machines
Committee of the IEEE Industry Applications Society. Manuscript submitted for
review October 15, 2000 and released for publication May 31, 2001.
K. Sitapati is with the Custom Motor Solutions Group, Kollmorgen, Radford,
VA 24141 USA (e-mail: ksitapati@kollmorgen.com).
R. Krishnan is with the Bradley Department of Electrical Engineering, Vir-
ginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA 24061 USA
(e-mail: kramu@vt.edu).
Publisher Item Identifier S 0093-9994(01)08314-1.
00939994/01$10.00 2001 IEEE
1219
I. INTRODUCTION
A XIAL FIELD machines are used in several applications
where the power density requirements are very high. Usu-
ally, there is some amount of forced cooling provided for con-
tinuous operation or the motor is derated or operated at rated
load with a small duty cycle. These machines are being used
in increasing numbers in aerospace, aviation and marine appli-
cations due to the small size and rugged construction features.
Their demand in commercial applications are increasing as the
complexity of manufacturing is coming down. A detailed per-
formance comparison would help in specifying the best machine
suited for a particular application.
Five different machine configurations are chosen for compar-
ison. All the machines are designed with surface mounted, per-
manent-magnet rotors. They consist of the following machines.
1) Type A, Conventional Radial Field: This is a typical ra-
dial field brushless dc motor with the permanent-magnet
structure rotating inside the stationary armature windings.
The stator is made up of electrical grade steel lamina-
tions with distributed windings. The rotor is cylindrical
in shape with a shaft on which the bearings are mounted.
2) Type B, Axial Field Single Air Gap: This is an axial field
motor with a single air gap. The stator is made up of elec-
trical grade steel laminations and distributed windings.
The shape of the stator as well as the rotor resembles a
pancake and these machines are commonly referred to as
pancake motors. In all the axial field machines, the rotor
rotates beside the stator with the flux crossing the air gap
in an axial direction. The stator iron is laminated in the
radial direction and resemble concentric rings that have
a constant slot width and tapered teeth. This makes the
tooth flux density constant at any diameter on the stator
due to a larger area available to carry the larger magnet
flux. Note that the magnets width and area increase as
the diameter increases.
3) Type C, Axial Field Dual Air Gap: This is an axial field
motor with two air gaps. There are two stator assemblies
on either side of the rotor. The advantage of this construc-
tion is cancellation of the axial attractive force between
the rotor and the stator that exist due to the force of at-
traction between the magnets and the stator steel.
4) Type D, Axial Field Slotless Single Air Gap: This is an
axial field slotless motor with a single air gap. The only
steel in the magnetic circuit is in the rotor yoke and in the
stator yoke or back iron. These machines require high-
energy rare-earth magnets to drive the flux through the
large air gap which accommodates the windings.
1220 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 37, NO. 5, SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001
TABLE I
0.25-kW DESIGN
TABLE II
1.0-kW DESIGN
TABLE III
3.0-kW DESIGN
5) Type E, Axial Field Slotless Dual Air Gap: This is an axial
field slotless motor with two air gaps. The only steel in the
motor is that of the two stator back irons (yokes). This de-
sign also cancels out the attractive forces that exist even in
the slotless single-air-gap axial field machine. The mag-
nets used here are also high-energy rare-earth magnets.
There is no back iron in the rotor and the magnet flux
crosses two air gaps.
II. BASIS FOR COMPARISON
To make the comparison, several parameters are held constant
or very near to each other. The radial field machine is designed
first to provide the benchmark and then the design of the axial
field machines is attempted.
The slot fill for all the slotted machines is kept constant with
a small variation for each of the power ratings. The slotless ma-
chines have different slot fills but they are made consistent with
the values obtained for each of the different ratings. The air gap,
yoke, and tooth flux densities are kept constant with some small
variation for each of the slotted designs. Tables IV give the pa-
rameters forming the basis for the design of machines for five
power levels. The following power ratings are chosen: 1/4, 1,
3, 5, and 10 kW for the shaft output power. All the machines
are designed using 375 V dc as the rated supply voltage. This
value corresponds to the dc voltage obtained when single-phase
440-V ac rms is rectified and this ac voltage is readily available
TABLE IV
5.0-kW DESIGN
TABLE V
10.0-kW DESIGN
in most industries. The rated speed is chosen to be 1000 r/min
with a no-load maximum speed of 2000 r/min for all the ma-
chines except the 1/4-kW machines. 2000 r/min was the rated
speed for these machines, with a 3000 r/min no-load speed at
375-V dc. All the designs used high-energy rare-earth sintered
NdFeB magnets. The winding currents are assumed to be lim-
ited at rated speed. The no-load speed of 2000 r/min corresponds
to a motor back-EMF constant of about 187 V/kr/min, line
to line. This parameter is also chosen so that the sizing com-
parison can be made for machines that can be replaced for a
certain application making the replacement transparent to the
motor drive electronics. All the performance calculations are
made using a three-phase six-step drive and the back EMFs of
all the machines are assumed to be trapezoidal. The 1/4-kW ma-
chines used a 12slot eight-pole combination while all the other
slotted designs used a 24-slot eight-pole design.
Tables IV give the values of the six parameters that are held
more or less a constant for each of the five different output power
levels. The slot fill is calculated assuming a fixed slot insulation
thickness and using square cross-sectional wire even though the
actual wire being used is circular. The flux densities in the steel
and air gap represent peak values. The magnet thickness is de-
fined in the direction of magnetization and, hence, radial in the
case of the conventional motor and axial in all other designs. It
is also assumed that the machines are cooled adequately such
that there is no possibility of demagnetization due to excessive
temperature. The magnets of all the machines are dimensioned
such that the considered stator currents do not demagnetize the
magnets. The three-phase windings are star connected. As the
power output gets larger, multiple strands of copper wire is used
in the stator coils. In actuality, the number of strands is usually
increased while decreasing the wire diameter so that forming
the conductors in the slots and the end turns becomes easier.
In each case except for the two smallest machines, the magnet
thickness in the direction of magnetization had to be increased
for the slotless machines due to the larger air gap created to
accommodate the windings. The cross section of the copper wire
SITAPATI AND KRISHNAN: RADIAL AND AXIAL FIELD, PERMANENT-MAGNET, BRUSHLESS MACHINES 1221

is increased with power output to reduce copper losses. All the TABLE VI
designs require forced cooling for continuous operation at rated OUTER DIAMETER IN MILLIMETERS
output power as indicated by the total power loss. The phase
resistance for each of the designs varies as a result of making
other parameters equal.
The air-gap flux density is nearly the same for all of the
slotted designs but falls sharply for the slotless designs due to
the large air gap. This drop would be even greater if the magnet
thickness were not increased. The dual-gap axial field motor has
a higher air-gap flux density than the single-gap slotless motor
because of the smaller air gap per side. In this case, the turns
required per slot pitch are almost half because of two stator as- TABLE VII
LENGTH IN MILLIMETERS
semblies.
The steel flux density is always kept below 1.2 T so the loss
per unit weight is nearly the same. Due to the absence of teeth,
the slotless machines have a much higher slot fill than the slotted
ones. The active iron volume is taken to be the volume of the
stator teeth, stator back iron, and rotor back iron. The active
weight is considered to be the weight of the active volume. This
approach neglects additional material required for the housing,
shaft, bearings, and cooling fan as they are specific to a given
application.
In summary, assumptions made for the comparison are as fol-
lows:
phase resistance kept nearly the same for each design;
wire size kept the same;
air-gap flux density kept nearly the same;
steel flux density kept nearly the same;
slot fill kept nearly the same;
shaft diameter is 20 mm;
shaft extension is 30 mm;
end-turns extension fixed at 10 mm per side;
bearings and end bells contained within 20 mm per side in
radial machines;
bearings contained inside the inner diameter of the stator
in axial machines;
package volume consists of active volume plus the addi-
tional space required for bearings, end bells, and end turns;
Fig. 1. Active volume versus output power.
active volume is the volume of stator teeth, yoke, and rotor
yoke;
active weight is the weight of the active volume; five topologies are similar, the length is very different. The axial
motor has a trapezoidal back-EMF wave shape and is com- field motor has a very small axial profile when compared to the
mutated by a six-step drive; radial field motor.
magnets never demagnetized by temperature rise as ade- The axial field motor topology is best suited in applications
quate cooling is provided. where the axial space is limited and a very flat profile is re-
quired. The slotless machines require a larger diameter due to
III. RESULTS OF THE COMPARISON the additional turns present. The space required for the end turns
also grows with the number of turns that are wound in each coil.
The results of the comparison are given in graphical form. For
The tables indicate that even though the diameter of the slotless
each of the power ratings, the comparisons consist of physical
machines are larger when compared to the slotted axial field ma-
size (diameter, length, and volume), moment of inertia, weight
chines, the length in the axial direction is smaller, offering the
of copper and iron, weight of magnet material, copper and iron
flattest profile of the five different topologies.
loss, power per unit moment of inertia, power per unit active
Fig. 1 shows the variation of total volume required for the five
weight, and power per unit active volume.
power ratings. It can be seen that the volume required for the radial
field motor is much larger than any of the axial field machines.
A. Volume This difference widens with increasing output. The slotless
Tables VI and VII show the motor outer diameter and length dual- and single-gap axial field machines have similar volumes.
for the five power ratings chosen. While the diameters of the The slotted axial field machines also have similar volumes.
1222 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 37, NO. 5, SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001

Fig. 2. Moment of inertia versus output power. Fig. 3. Steel weight versus output power.

B. Moment of Inertia
Fig. 2 shows the variation of moment of inertia.
For any power rating, the radial field motor has the largest
moment of inertia. This is due to the longer rotor length as well
as the assumption that the rotor is solid. The longer motor length
is required because the torque is produced at a fixed air-gap di-
ameter which is effectively smaller than the axial field motor
where the torque-producing diameter grows radially for a fixed
air-gap length. In applications where rapid acceleration and de-
celeration are required, the axial field motor is the better choice.
All of the axial field topologies have a similar moment of inertia.
For the single-gap machines, the rotor contains both the magnets
as well as the magnet back iron constituting the return path for
the magnet flux.
For the dual-gap units, the magnet thickness is larger, but the
densities of steel and magnet are very similar. This makes the Fig. 4. Copper weight versus output power.
moment of inertia of the axial field machines more or less equal.
The dual-gap slotless machine has the lowest moment of inertia volume of the axial field machines is generally smaller than
as it does not contain any steel in the rotor and the density of the the radial field motor. This means that the weight will also be
magnet material is slightly lower than that of steel. Additional smaller and this agrees with the calculated parameters shown in
material that is used to retain the magnets and couple them to the Fig. 3.
shaft has been ignored. It is valid to do this because of the vast
difference in the moment of inertia between the axial and radial D. Copper Weight
field machines as shown in Fig. 2. This difference in moment of Fig. 4 shows the variation of the required copper in each of the
inertia of the rotor is singularly the biggest difference between machines. The maximum copper is required by the single-gap
the radial and axial field machines. slotless motor (type D). This is due to the fact that the flux den-
sity is low in the air gap and there is space in only one stator for
C. Steel Weight the winding. This motor also requires a larger number of turns
Fig. 3 shows the variation of the weight of iron required for per coil to match the back-EMF constant value that was speci-
each of the power ratings. It can be seen that as the power rating fied earlier.
increases, the slotless machines require less iron than the radial The copper required by the radial field and single-gap axial
field machines. They are similar in value at lower ratings with field slotted machines is almost identical. Both the dual-gap
the radial field motor requiring the least iron. The lowest iron slotless and slotted axial field machines require less copper than
weight is in the single-gap slotless motor that does not have any the radial field machine due to the presence of a larger magnet
teeth or tooth tips. The only iron in the electromagnetic circuit area. This also indicates that for a given value of output power,
is in the stator and rotor yokes. The next higher weight is in the the single-gap slotless motor will experience the largest copper
single-gap slotted motor followed by the dual-gap slotless and loss. The lowest weight in type C is due to the fact that the stator
the dual-gap slotted motor. teeth help to guide the flux across a small air gap, thus creating
Intuitively, it may be seen that as the total volume of the motor a better utilization of the air-gap flux density as well due to this
gets larger, the weight also increases. Fig. 1 shows that the total topology having two stators. In the case of the dual-gap slotted
SITAPATI AND KRISHNAN: RADIAL AND AXIAL FIELD, PERMANENT-MAGNET, BRUSHLESS MACHINES
Fig. 5. Magnet weight versus output power.
machine, there are two stators that can be wound and the gener-
ated back EMF is a result of contribution from both the wound
stators, thus almost halving the required turns. In the case of
the slotless machines, the thicker magnet and larger diameter
reduces the requirement for a large number of turns.
E. Magnet Weight
Fig. 5 shows the variation of the required magnet weight. The
pole span for all the machines is taken to be 170 electrical de-
grees. All the machines are designed using 35 MGOe energy
product sintered NdFeB material.
The two axial field slotless machines require the maximum
magnet volume and, hence, weight due to the large air gaps
present. The dual-gap slotless machine requirement is slightly
lower than the single-gap slotless machine due to two available
stators. It is to be noted that the slotted axial field motors re-
quire less magnet material than the radial field machine for all
the power ratings.
F. Copper Losses
The copper losses are in the same ratio as the weight of
copper. The current required by each of the machines at each
of the power ratings is the same and losses are directly propor-
tional to the weight. At larger power outputs, the single-gap
slotless axial field motor has high copper losses and will require
some form of forced cooling unless the duty cycle is very small.
The radial field motor and the slotted single- and dual-gap
axial field machines have very similar copper losses and have
the lowest values. It is applicable, as these are the three ma-
chines that have stators to help carry the magnet flux. Thus, they
require lower turns per coil for the same generated back EMF
when compared to the machines without any stator slots. Then,
the air gap becomes large, resulting in a larger number of turns
per coil for the same induced EMF. The dual-gap slotless axial
field motor copper loss lies in between these and the single-gap
slotless motor. The copper loss variation is shown in Fig. 6
Copper losses can be reduced further by increasing the wire
size, which will result in a larger machine size. The alternative
will be to increase the magnetic loading of the machine by in-
creasing the air-gap flux density. This will result in a lower re-
1223
Fig. 6. Copper loss versus output power.
Fig. 7. Iron loss versus output power.
sistance as the number of turns reduces, but this increases the
cost of the magnets which can cost much more than the cost of
cooling.
G. Iron Losses
Fig. 7 shows the iron loss variation for each of the designs.
This is directly proportional to the weight of iron as the flux
density is nearly the same for all cases. The commutation fre-
quency is also low, making the iron losses very low for all the
machines at the power rating and speed chosen.
The lowest iron loss is of the single gap slotless axial motor
which has the lowest iron weight. This is followed by the single
gap slotted motor. The radial field, dual gap slotted and the dual
gap slotless machines have very similar iron loss because of
their similar weights. If there is sufficient cooling available, the
single-gap slotless axial field motor can be used when minimum
weight is required for a given power rating.
As with the case of the copper losses, iron losses can be re-
duced by increasing the amount of iron in the teeth and back
irons. This will lower the flux density, but will increase the
package size and weight of the motor. The slotless machines
do not have much loss in the rotor back iron, but undergo loss
in the stator back iron where the flux from to the magnets and
1224 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 37, NO. 5, SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001

Fig. 8. Total loss versus output power. Fig. 9. Torque/moment of inertia versus output power.

stator currents undergo reversal of direction whose frequency is

in proportion to the rated speed. This is unavoidable as the stator
back iron is required for the magnet flux return path. This loss
in the dual-gap slotless machine is larger as it is built up of two
stator back iron assemblies. Appendix II shows how the core
loss is calculated for this study.

H. Total Losses
Fig. 8 shows the sum of the copper and iron losses. As the
iron losses are not as significant as the copper losses, the total
loss trend is to follow the copper loss. The radial field motor,
dual-gap, slotted, and slotless machines have very similar total
losses. The slotless single-gap motor has the highest loss with
the slotless dual-gap axial field machine in between.
It must be noted that the losses shown in Fig. 8 indicate only
the electromagnetic losses. There are other factors that add, such
as bearing friction and preload loss, loss due to air resistance,
and other stray losses which are not calculated in this paper.
Some of these losses are highly dependent on the mechanical
design of the motor and may also depend on the final configu-
ration of the machine. Friction and preload losses will be sig-
nificantly lower in the dual-gap and radial field machines than
the single-gap axial field machines due to the attractive force be-
tween the rotor and stator. In these machines, the force of attrac-
tion has to be canceled by a mechanical arrangement and there
is some friction loss associated with this and it is inevitable. The
magnitude of this loss is proportional to the force of attraction
which is a function of the magnet strength, air-gap length, and
the outer and inner diameters of the magnet and stator assem-
blies. Windage losses may be low due to the relatively low speed
of operation.
I. Torque per Unit Moment of Inertia
Fig. 9 shows the variation of the ratio of shaft torque per unit
moment of inertia for each of the designs. This is an important
parameter as it gives an indication of the acceleration of the rotor
and the mechanical response for any power rating.
The figure shows that the radial field motor has the lowest
torque for a given moment of inertia. This is because the rotor
has the largest length for any given power rating. It is also to be
Fig. 10. Power/active weight versus output power.
noted that there is little variation as the output power increases.
The single-gap slotless motor is next, as the rotor contains back
iron, making the weight higher than the other axial machines.
The larger magnet required to drive flux through the large air
gap requires a thicker back iron, making this motor have the
lowest axial field machine torque per unit moment of inertia. By
the same argument, the dual-gap slotless motor has the largest
value, with the slotted axial machines in between.
At lower power levels, all the axial field machines have mo-
ment of inertia values that are similar, but as the power levels
grow the differences between the axial machines provide an in-
dication of the motor best suited for an application. The axial
field dual-air-gap machine does not contain any rotor back iron,
which reduces the weight of the rotor. Also, the magnet mate-
rial density is assumed to be lower than that of steel, making this
rotor have the lowest moment of inertia.
J. Power per Unit Active Weight
Fig. 10 shows the variation of the ratio of power per unit active
weight for each of the designs. The active weight consists of
the copper and iron weight required by the magnetic circuit. At
higher power levels, the radial field motor ratio drops away from
the axial field machines.
SITAPATI AND KRISHNAN: RADIAL AND AXIAL FIELD, PERMANENT-MAGNET, BRUSHLESS MACHINES
Fig. 11. Power/active volume versus output power.
K. Power per Unit Active Volume
Fig. 11 shows the variation of the ratio of power per unit active
volume for each of the designs. The active volume is the volume
of the active weights. It can be seen that the radial field motor
is significantly low for all of the power levels considered. The
power per active volume grows for the axial field machines with
the output power. This makes the axial motor a good choice
where space is limited, especially at large power levels.
IV. CONCLUSION
For five different output power levels, one radial field and four
axial field topologies were compared. The comparison consisted
of volume, weight, power loss, and inertia. From the data pre-
sented in the previous sections, it is inferred that axial field ma-
chines have a smaller volume for a given power rating, making
the power density very high. For a given magnet material and
air-gap flux density, the rotor moment of inertia of the radial
field motor tends to be larger than all of the axial field ma-
chines in this comparison. The weight of iron required in the
axial field designs is lower than that required in the radial field
motor, making the active weight of axial field machines smaller.
The slotless axial field machines require more magnet material
than the radial field machine. However, the slotted axial field
machines require less material than the radial field machine. The
copper loss in the slotless dual-gap machines is higher than that
of the slotted radial field machine.
APPENDIX I
MACHINE GEOMETRY DETAILS AND DESIGN PROCEDURE
The moment of inertia of the rotor is calculated using the ma-
terials that formed the magnetic circuit as well as assuming that
the radial field motor has a solid rotor made up of a nonmag-
netic material with the same density of steel. A shaft extension
of 30 mm with a 20-mm diameter was added to the calculations
in all cases. The magnet density is assumed to be 6.5 g/cc and
steel density as 7.5 g/cc for all of the designs. The weight of iron
required by the motor is the same as the weight of iron required
by the magnetic circuit. This may vary in practice depending
on the design, application, and specification as additional ma-
1225
terial may be required for the construction of the motor. The
design procedure followed in this paper is described in detail in
[5]. The authors made several modifications to the procedure to
ensure that the required parameters described earlier were held
constant between designs.
APPENDIX II
CORE LOSS CALCULATIONS
Core loss is calculated by using the loss versus flux density
data provided by the electrical grade steel manufacturer. It is
assumed that there are no rotor losses as well as all the core
losses are contributed only by the magnet flux. A cubic spline
algorithm is used to calculate the loss per kilogram at 60 Hz for
the flux density in the teeth and stator. The following equation
is used for the total loss in the stator teeth:
A similar equation is used for the loss in the stator yoke where
all variables represent the parameters referenced to the stator
yoke
and are coefficients that are used in the equations for the
stator teeth and stator yoke loss and their numerical values are
obtained from actual tests on machines whose design data are
available and the theoretical data is curve fitted to the actual test
data. They generally vary from 1.25 to 2.0 for the stator yoke
and 1.75 to 2.75 for the stator teeth. and are the power
coefficients for the frequency and the flux density. These values
range between 12. Their values used to calculate core loss in
this paper are 1.33 and 2.0, respectively.
REFERENCES
[1] R. Krishnan and A. J. Beutler, Performance and design of an axial
field PM synchronous motor servo drive, in Conf. Rec. IEEE-IAS Annu.
Meeting, 1985, pp. 634640.
[2] F. Caricchi, F. Crescimbini, and O. Honorati, Low-cost compact
PM machine for adjustable-speed pump application, in Conf. Rec.
IEEE-IAS Annu. Meeting, vol. 1, 1996, pp. 464470.
[3] H. Takano, T. Ito, K. Mori, A. Sakuta, and T. Hirasa, Optimum values
for magnet and armature winding thickness for axial-field permanent
magnet brushless DC motors, IEEE Trans. Ind. Applicat., vol. 28, pp.
350357, Mar./Apr. 1992.
[4] S. Geetha and D. Platt, Axial flux PM servo motor with sixteen poles,
in Conf. Rec. IEEE-IAS Annu. Meeting, vol. 1, 1992, pp. 286291.
[5] D. Hanselman, Brushless Permanent-Magnet Motor Design. New
York: McGraw-Hill, 1994.
[6] J. F. Gieras and M. Wing, Permanent Magnet Motor Technology. New
York: Marcel Dekker, 1996.
Kartik Sitapati received the B.E. degree in electrical
engineering from the National Institute of Engi-
neering, Mysore, India, and the M.E. degree from
the University of Maine, Orono, in 1993 and 1995,
respectively. He is currently working toward the Ph.D.
degree in electrical engineering at Virginia Poly-
technic Institute and State University, Blacksburg.
He is also currnetly with the Custom Motor So-
lutions Group, Kollmorgen, Radford, VA, where he
works as a permanent-magnet brushless motor de-
signer.
1226 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 37, NO. 5, SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2001

R. Krishnan (S81M82SM95F01) received

the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from
Concordia University, Montreal, QC, Canada, in
1982.
He started his teaching career with the University
of Madras in 1972. He was a Staff Engineer and then
a Principal Engineer in the Gould Research Center
from 1982 to 1985. Since then, he has been with
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University,
Blacksburg. He is a Professor of Electrical and
Computer Engineering and his research interests are
in electric motor drives and applied control. He is also the Director of the Center
for Rapid Transit Systems (CRTS), pursuing unique, safe, high-speed, en-
ergy-efficient and personal electric transit solutions and their implementations
in the U.S. He developed novel multidisciplinary undergraduate courses to meet
the industrial demands by cofounding virtual corporations and directing them.
He has developed many proprietary motor drives, converters for PM brushless
dc, switched reluctance, and induction motor drives, controllers for ac and
switched reluctance motor drives, uninterruptible power supplies, an electronic
stunner, and personal medical monitors. Some are in industrial practice and
others are under consideration for market. He has organized and conducted
short courses on vector-controlled induction motor drives, PM synchronous
and brushless dc motor drives, and switched reluctance motor drives in the
U.S., France, Italy, Korea, and Denmark. He is the author of Electric Motor
Drives (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 2001) and Switched Reluctance
Motor Drives (Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2001). His book PM Synchronous
and Brushless DC Motor Drives is scheduled for release in 2002.
Dr. Krishnan is a Fellow of the Center for Organizational and Technological
Advancement (COTA) at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.