Rate My Professor Ned Mohan

Ned Mohan was the Regents Professor and Oscar A. Schott Professor of Power Electronics and Systems in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, a prominent Engineering faculty member renowned for his contributions to power electronics. He earned a B.Tech. in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur in 1967, an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of New Brunswick in 1969, an M.S. in Nuclear Engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1972, and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1973. Following a postdoctoral fellowship at UW-Madison from 1973 to 1975, Mohan joined the University of Minnesota faculty in 1976, where he founded the Center for Electrical Energy (UMCEE) in 1981, developed graduate programs, and was appointed Regents Professor in 2019.

Mohan's research specialized in power electronics and electric energy systems, encompassing modeling, analysis, and control of power-electronic interfaces for renewable energy, electric drives, and energy storage, with recent emphasis on modular multi-level and matrix converter topologies. He secured pioneering patents including a current-shaping circuit for photovoltaic systems (1978), active filters (1979), Minnesota Rectifier for electric vehicle charging (1994), and an ultra-compact DC-DC converter for aircraft (2003, NASA-funded). He authored six widely adopted textbooks, translated into nine languages, such as Power Electronics: Converters, Applications, and Design (3rd edition, 2003, co-authored with Robbins and Undeland), Power Electronics: A First Course (2011), and Electric Power Systems: A First Course (2012). His educational impact included NSF-funded hardware laboratories commercialized by Vishay HiRel Systems and adopted by over 100 universities worldwide, 19 graduate-level video courses disseminated via the Consortium for Sustainable Power (CUSP), and implementation of flipped classroom methodology. Mohan mentored 54 doctoral students—many in prestigious academic positions or at companies like Tesla, Apple, and General Motors—and nearly 200 graduate students overall. Major awards include election to the National Academy of Engineering (2014) for integrating electronics into power systems and innovations in power engineering education, IEEE James H. Mulligan, Jr. Education Medal (2022), IEEE Fellow (1996), IEEE PES Ramakumar Renewable Energy Excellence Award (2012), IEEE PES Nari Hingorani FACTS Award (2014), and Regents Professorship (2019). He led NSF and ONR-funded workshops, served on the Minnesota Power Systems Conference organizing committee, and contributed to diversity initiatives through NSF-REU programs.