GaN or Gallium Nitride Transistors have been in the news for their high-frequency and high-efficiency applications. Anyone interested in the Power Converter domain will love this open-source project by Siemens. The offering is called SDI TAPAS and it is a multipurpose GaN FET based board with a TMS320F28x controller onboard.

A quick look at the schematic reveals a lot of stuff going on like current and voltage sense chips along with a neatly designed GaN power stage with by-the-book drivers. There is a plethora of connectors on-board including one for the Raspberry Pi which is an added bonus. The git repository comes with sample code to get you off the ground, with examples running BLDC motors as well as connect it to Siemens MindSphere Cloud Platform.

This platform can be used in a number of functions in addition to motor control, such as battery charging, solar energy harvesting, and wireless charging. There is a presentation(PDF) that is available for download, and if you are looking for use cases there are a number of user build projects on their community site. The schematic and board designs can be used to make your own, or you could ask them for a sample board and they might give away more on their community site.

For those starting out, you might appreciate this tutorial on Buck Converter Efficiency to get a feel for the hardware that goes into such experiments.