A FPGA-based rapid prototyping approach for teaching of Mechatronics Engineering (original) (raw)
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This paper covers the development of student development system to use with the Altera Max+ PLUS software for teaching Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA's) and Complex Programmable Logic Devices (CPLD's). This software is available free of charge from Altera directly for students to download for use in at home or can be installed via an educational license in any university laboratory. The student version of the software includes a schematic editor and design entry, waveform editor for design entry, Altera Hardware Description Language design (AHDL) Entry, and the industry standard VHDL (VHSIC (Very High Speed Integrated Circuits) Hardware Description Language) design entry. Thus this system can be used to teach all of the major design techniques used in modern digital circuit design. The hardware portion of the development system includes an in-circuit programmable Altera CPLD on a printed circuit board (PCB) with adequate space on the breadboard area for students to development their own projects. The programming is done using a standard PC parallel port; thus there is no need for any additional programming hardware. Also mounted on the board are DB-25 and DB-9 connectors for implementing serial communication laboratories. The current system is using a standard student breadboard that is mounted onto the development board, and jumpers are used to connect the pins from the CPLD to the breadboard area or the serial connectors. There is also a laboratory manual, containing thirteen laboratory assignments and a list of final projects, that accompanies the development system designed to take a second semester Electrical Engineering Technology student from a basic introduction to Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) to a final project using the Altera Hardware Descriptive Language (AHDL), along with a short introduction to VHDL. The manual stresses basic design techniques along with simulation analysis prior to implementing the designs on the development hardware. The board has been used at Indiana Purdue University at Fort Wayne for the last three years, and the laboratory manual has just been developed.
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Embedded systems play vital role in modern applications [1]. They can be found in autos, washing machines, electrical appliances and even in toys. FPGAs are the most recent computing technology that is used in embedded systems. There is an increasing demand on FPGA based embedded systems, in particular, for applications that require rapid time responses. Engineering education curricula needs to respond to the increasing industrial demand of using FPGAs by introducing new syllabus for teaching and learning this subject. This paper describes the development of new course material for teaching FPGA-based embedded systems design by using 'G' Programming Language of LabVIEW. A general overview of FPGA role in engineering education is provided. A survey of available Hardware Programming Languages for FPGAs is presented. A survey about LabVIEW utilization in engineering education is investigated; this is followed by a motivation section of why to use LabVIEW graphical programming in teaching and its capabilities. Then, a section of choosing a suitable kit for the course is laid down. Later, constructivist closed-loop model the FPGA course has been proposed in accordance with [2-4; 80,86,89,92]. The paper is proposing a pedagogical framework for FPGA teaching; pedagogical evaluation will be conducted in future studies. The complete study has been done at the Faculty of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Aleppo University.
A Software Package to Facilitate Teaching Introductory Level Mechatronics
This paper describes a software package that is designed to facilitate teaching an introductory course on Mechatronics in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Middle East Technical University. This course attracts students from multiple disciplines. Being offered at the third semester, rather than focusing on theoretical aspects of different disciplines, this course focuses on the system integration aspect of Mechatronics systems and emphasizes this with hands-on laboratory exercises and a semester project. The semester project requires the design and construction of a simple closed loop system. To make the programming aspect of these projects easier, it is intended to develop the necessary software on a PC rather than an embedded platform. To facilitate this, a software package is developed. With the help of this package and a microcontroller board (Basic Stamp 2), students can easily setup simple closed loop systems, interface them to the computer and design a controller in...
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This article shares experience and lessons learned in teaching course on programmable logic design at Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta, Indonesia. This course is part of bachelor of engineering (electrical) degree program. Projectbased approach is chosen to strengthen these students' understanding and practical skills. Each year's project involves challenges for the students to solve by implementing digital system on an FPGA design board. Here, background and curriculum context of the course will be presented. The projects and their challenges will be discussed. Finally, lessons learned and future improvement on the student projects will be discussed.
Advanced Digital Laboratory: An FPGA-Based Remote Laboratory for Teaching Digital Electronics
The experimentation component of most Science and Engineering curricula in Nigeria is inadequate. In Obafemi Awolowo University for example, undergraduate students typically carry out around five assignments related to digital electronics, and there is no treatment whatsoever of Field Programmable Gate Arrays(FPGAs). In the research work being reported, an attempt has been made to develop a remote laboratory though which the number of digital electronics experiments students carry out can be increased. The remote laboratory, called the Advanced Digital Lab (ADLab), allows students to synthesis digital systems on an FPGA with a hardware description language. To achieve this, a development board with an Altera Cyclone II FPGA is connected to a computer implementing the server tier of the iLab batched architecture. The client through which the remote student interacts with the ADLab is implemented with Java, which allows for a reasonable amount of platform independence. This paper discusses the software and hardware aspects of the ADLab architecture and gives some insight into some design decisions. The paper also reports that the system is being tested at Obafemi Awolowo University and that student feedback so far indicates high student satisfaction with the remote laboratory.
2018 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition Proceedings
He worked eight years in industry at various capacities. He is working with Purdue University Calumet for the past 27 years. He consults for industry on process control, packaging machinery system design, control and related disciplines. He is a senior member of IEEE and he served in IEEE/Industry Application Society for 15 years at various capacities. He served as chair of Manufacturing Systems Development Applications Department (MSDAD) of IEEE/IAS. Currently, he is serving a two-year term as the chair of the Instrumentation of ASEE (American Society of Engineering Education). He authored over 29 refereed journal and conference publications. In 2009 he as PI received NSF-CCLI grant entitled A Mechatronics Curriculum and Packaging Automation Laboratory Facility. In 2010 he as Co-PI received NSF-ATE grant entitled Meeting Workforce Needs for Mechatronics Technicians. From 2003 through 2006, he was involved with Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL in developing direct computer control for hydrogen powered automotives. He is also involved in several direct computer control and wireless process control related research projects. His current interests are in the area of packaging machinery system design & control, industrial transducers, industrial process control systems, modeling and simulation of Mechatronics devices and systems in virtual environment, programmable logic controllers, programmable logic devices, renewable energy related projects, wireless controls, statistical process control, computer aided design and fabrication of printed circuit board.
Augmenting Computer Architecture Classroom Experience with FPGAs Based Learning
Computer architecture is often taught by using software to design and simulate hardware modules and then using individual components to implement them. Our aim in this paper is to share our teaching experience of this subject in a way to enhance student learning outcome by developing projects for the computer architecture lab to help students better understand the theoretical concepts of the subject and to gain hands-on type of experience and apply that for more realistic projects. As a result, we have noticed that students show better interest in learning and understanding the subject materials over the last few semesters. We present in this work an ALU computer module design exercise as we used it in our computer architecture course. This approach can be well adopted for a first course in digital logic design, computer organization, and/or computer architecture. In specific, we designed and implemented an 8-bit arithmetic and logic unit, which performs 14 different arithmetic and logic operations. We did the design, simulation, and FPGA-based implementation of the proposed ALU module using QUARTUS II design software and Altera DE2 FPGA Board.
Special Features of the Educational Component Design of Devices on Microcontrollers and Fpga
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Questions of features of the distribution and the implementation of the educational component "Design of devices on microcontrollers and field programmed logical gate arrays" with the support of all stakeholders' requirements to the latest technical knowledge are considered. Structural and technical description of the educational component is discussed.
During the last years the presence of remote laboratories has been growing. However, many labs focus on providing a very specific experience, intended to prove a specific point or to carry out a specific practice, rather than to help the student acquire a wider range of skills through several different uses of the lab. This paper describes the creation of Boole-WebLab-FPGA, a system which integrates Boole-Deusto -an educational electronics design tool-and WebLab-Deusto-FPGA. The latter is a hybrid remote laboratory which lets users program a real FPGA board remotely. This real, physical board has been given the capability to interact with not only real hardware (LEDs), but also with virtual simulations of more complicated models, such as a watertank. The integration of these tools in a single system provides an attractive workflow for teachers and students. Students can design a combinational circuit easily through Boole-Deusto and immediately (in the same lecture session, if they so wish) try it on real hardware. Because additionally that real hardware can also be interacting with a virtual simulation, a wide range of experiments can be proposed and the replay potential of the laboratory is increased.