It was early obvious that Daniela Berger's professional life would one day revolve around electrical engineering: After attending the vocational school for electrical engineering/energy technology, she studied at the University of Technology in Graz, specializing in energy technology with a focus on high-voltage technology. Since 2012, she has been working at AVL in the Advanced Measurement Technologies department. "We deal with developing measurement technology for applications in areas such as the automotive industry, aviation, railroads and wind energy. The core of our work is high-precision data acquisition for different sensors. Our devices are characterized by the fact that they acquire data very quickly and make calculations based on it. A standard device records at two megasamples per second per channel. This means that two million measurement points are acquired and stored per second," reports the expert. Applications range from a cylinder pressure curve in a classic combustion engine, to currents and voltages used to calculate the performance and efficiency of inverters, electric motors and entire powertrains, to electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (note: a special stimulus-response method) for batteries, fuel cells or electrolyzers.

Every day is different

The department's goal: to gather customer requirements in order to bring innovative standard products to market. The projects that Daniela Berger leads are always development projects that start with a feasibility study and the construction of a prototype and end with a market-ready product. "Depending on the complexity, our projects, like the development of a new data acquisition system, go on for several years. But that's what I find particularly exciting about my work: that every day is different and brings new challenges." Currently, the electrical engineer is working on several projects in two major areas. One of them, where AVL started to establish itself more than 10 years ago, is in the field of measurement technology for electrification applications. "In the electrical impedance spectroscopy sector, on the other hand, we are developing innovative automotive applications for which there are currently no competitors in subsectors," Berger says.

A dynamic process
Keeping track of current technical advances is unavoidable in her job, she says. Especially now, when everything is moving away from the combustion engine and toward other technologies. "The question of where we are heading in the field of drives is subject to a very dynamic process. Since we offer metrology solutions for all divisions, it's something that keeps us very busy." What makes working at AVL stand out for her? "That I work with very nice colleagues. Since you spend a lot of your time at work, that's an important aspect for me. In addition, the company offers a wide variety of working time models that are adapted to the respective phase of life - that's also what makes it so special."