Conference Session

Project-Based Learning in ECE Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Arif Uluagac; Douglas Williams, Georgia Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

modules use National Instruments'LabVIEW for their programming and development platform with the Speedy-33 DSP board andLEGO Mindstorms NXT Brick as the hardware platforms. Many of the modules can also be runcompletely on the host computer's sound card. Modules have been developed for examiningdifferent aspects of topics such as sampling, aliasing, and filtering, while working with data thathas been captured and processed in real-time. Students are able to interact with the hardware anddata through GUIs, thus obviating the need to first develop real-time programming skills. Thispaper will describe these modules and how they are designed to be used both in lectures and aspart of homework assignments.1. IntroductionRecent advances in embedded

Conference Session

ECE Pedagogy and Assessment II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Dale Buechler, University of Wisconsin-Platteville

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

as feedback. Lecture notes andreadings are posted in advance to allow efficient coverage of the theory and more time for in-class examples and assessment. In-class “board-work” using the document camera is scannedand placed on the class webpage. Electronic submission of homework and projects isencouraged, allowing students to make fewer trips to campus. Fourth, flexibility should beincorporated into the course syllabus. Most non-traditional students have outside commitmentssuch as work and family which require missing at least 1 class per semester. Allowing studentsto drop their worst exam, quiz, homework, etc., helps students overcome such absences. Finally,assessment needs to be an integral part of each course. Instructors need to

Conference Session

ECE Pedagogy and Assessment II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Dorian Yeager, Grove City College

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

set of non-negative integers, and is thereforeappropriately styled a “step function”. We define, for each complex number c, if ; otherwise, if the iteration below terminates then the value will be the terminalvalue of the integer variable n: n := 0 z := 0 while |z| < 3 do: z +c n := n + 1 end whileFinally, if the above iteration does not terminate before some prearranged number MAXIT ofiterations, then is given the value MAXIT.The Mandelbrot set is the set of all complex numbers c for which will always be MAXITno matter how large that constant is chosen to be. In other words, the Mandelbrot set is the set ofcomplex numbers for which the iteration

Conference Session

ECE Poster Session

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Bill Yang, Western Carolina University; Yeqin Huang, Western Carolina University; Robert Adams, Western Carolina University; James Zhang, Western Carolina University; Kenneth Burbank, Western Carolina University

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

(1b) cwhere n is the index of refraction, ω is the frequency of light and c is the speed of light invacuum. These are in general vector equations in three dimensional (3-D) space, but mosttextbooks use the linear polarization assumption to simplify them into scalar wave equations.For planar waveguides, usually a one-dimensional (1-D) model is used as illustrated in Figure 1. y E ∂/∂y=0 y H ∂/∂y=0 n2 n2 n1 H n1 E -a a x -a a x TE

Conference Session

Design in the ECE Curriculum

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

James Friauf, Milwaukee School of Engineering; Stephen Williams, Milwaukee School of Engineering; Steven Reyer, Milwaukee School of Engineering; Owe Petersen, Milwaukee School of Engineering

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

thereare numerous other writing tasks as well, all intended to parallel business and industryrequirements. They focus on providing evidence of individual contributions and range fromengineering notebook entries to bi-weekly “elevator” style reports – very short succinct reportsthat demonstrate the progress made in the latest time interval. Finally, in conjunction with our“trade-show”-style Senior Design Show in May of each year, each team must create a posterwith a primary pictorial emphasis to highlight their design. This is part of a poster competitionthat takes place the same day.BackgroundMuch has been written about the essentials of writing requirements in various curricula settingsand career preparations.1-3 Surveys repeatedly have

Conference Session

New Trends in ECE Education I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Fred Cady, (Retired) Montana State University; John McLellan, Freescale Semiconductor

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

criterion has taken into account such factors as commercial popularity, referencematerial availability, third-party resources and available feature set.Table 1 Microcontroller Application Modules Processor Architecture RAM (kB) Flash ROM (kB) Bus Clock (MHz) HCS08QG8 HCS08 0.512 8 10 MC9S12C32 HCS12 2 32 25 MC9S12DT256 HCS12 12 256 25 HCS12XDT512 HCX12 20 512 40 DSP56F801 DSP 4 24 80 MCF5211 ColdFire V2

Conference Session

Design in the ECE Curriculum

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jin-Hwan Lee, University of Cincinnati; Ali Asgar Bhagat, University of Cincinnati; Karen Davis, University of Cincinnati; Ian Papautsky, University of Cincinnati

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

Computer Engineering. It now includes students from mechanicalengineering, environmental engineering, biomedical engineering, and chemistry.Figure 1. MEMS and BioMEMS courses offered at the University of Cincinnati.Fifth-year undergraduate students (seniors) in the Electrical and Computer EngineeringDepartment take a sequence of 3 senior capstone courses for a total of 9 credit hours in theirsenior year.4 Typically, students self-organize into teams and select a project of interest. Theymay choose a variety of projects proposed by industry, community organizations, professors, co-op employers, or themselves. All teams meet with the course instructor and complete a series ofdeliverables to specify and document their projects. Each team has a

Conference Session

ECE Poster Session

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Eric Freudenthal, University of Texas at El Paso; Brian Carter, University of Texas at El Paso; Frederick Kautz, University of Texas at El Paso; Alexandria Ogrey, University of Texas at El Paso; Robert Preston, University of Texas at El Paso; Arthur Walton, University of Texas at El Paso

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

implementations of programfragments. Lab assignments utilize both languages and introduce students to commandinterpreters, scripting, collaborative development tools, and subroutine linkage of procedurallanguages. Assignments are distributed, “handed in,” and grades distributed using thesubversion source code repository.The reformed course’s outcomes are a superset of the original, with extensions including (1)understanding of C and its runtime environment, (2) parse trees, and (3) implementation ofdynamic memory management.ContextObject-oriented design is accepted as a primary programming model2 and many computerscience departments have adopted Java as their principal teaching language in many lower-division courses. Furthermore, Java programs are

Conference Session

ECE Poster Session

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Asad Azemi, Pennsylvania State University

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

can potentially lead to ineffectiveclassroom teaching 1-3. There are also works that have focused on making their PowerPointpresentations more effective 4.Teaching with Tablet PCs has recently attracted attention as a potential tool for educational useand a “Classroom Presenter” system has been developed 5-7 for delivering computer sciencecourses. Surveys of this system 5-7 indicate that students pay more attention and gain a betterunderstanding of the course material. The system described in [5] was further extended forcollaboration and active learning within the classroom, where students could submit digital ink-based material to the lecturer, within a Tablet PC-based classroom, to display on the projector 8.Based on our experience, the

Conference Session

Design in the ECE Curriculum

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Frank Kragh; Jeffrey Reed; Carl Dietrich; Donna Miller

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

Conference Session

ECE Pedagogy and Assessment I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Steven Northrup, Western New England College; John Burke, Western New England College

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

, there seemed to be a huge disconnect. There was noticeable knowledge lossover the summer break. It is well documented that knowledge retention decays over time9.Therefore, in the feedback discussions, faculty brainstormed ideas for refreshing the memories ofthe junior level students. The first key change at the course level of the junior microelectronicswas the requirement of summer homework. It was believed that students who did their summerhomework, would have better knowledge retention. Thus, over the summer, students wererequired to do homework problems similar to those shown in Figure 1 and to bring thoseproblems with them to the first class of the microelectronics course. Figure 1: Example summer homework problem

Conference Session

New Trends in ECE Education II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Saeed Monemi, California State Polytechnic University-Pomona; Zekeriya Aliyazicioglu, California State Polytechnic University-Pomona

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

, vocal functions may be the only means ofcontrolling a wheel chair.Goals and Objectives`The objective of this project was to modify an electric wheelchair with voice recognitionso that voice commands can be used to control the movements of the wheelchair. Theidea is to better aid the mobility of users with extreme disabilities, such as paraplegics(paralyzes from the waist down) and quadriplegics (paralyzes from the neck down).The following goals were identified by the faculty and students: 1. Design a new wheelchair controller that uses voice recognition. 2. Interface the voice recognition with the new controller. 3. Interface the controller with the electric wheelchair. 4. Implement sensors to detect nearby objects in order to

Conference Session

Design in the ECE Curriculum

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Mark Cambron, Western Kentucky University; Walter Collett, Western Kentucky University; Stacy Wilson, Western Kentucky University

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

is dedicated to project-based learning (PBL).Engaging students with the concrete, hands-on, and real-world problems is a great motivator.PBL has grown in acceptance in the undergraduate community during the past two decades. 1-4WKU’s EE faculty are focused on undergraduate education. Our faculty are rewarded andrequired to engage students in activities to support the development of a clear understanding ofengineering practice.5 Our goal is to provide students with relevant project experiences insideand outside the classroom. Faculty have developed a series of experiences throughout thecurriculum to support this mission which culminates in a year long design sequence. Studentsprepare for outstanding professional leadership by participating in

Conference Session

New Trends in ECE Education I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Andrew O'Fallon, Washington State University; Jack R Hagemeister, Washington State University; Clint Cole, Washington State University, Pullman; Joseph Harris, Digilent Inc.

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

to start with. In this way we kept the initial cost down and had theflexibility to only include peripherals that we could include in our course.The Digilent CerebotII Embedded Controller Board, shown in Figure 1, is designed around theATmega64L microcontroller. The board provides a stable platform for an introductory oradvanced microcontrollers and embedded systems courses. The board is designed to beinexpensive, less than $40, and very versatile. The CerebotII contains eight R/C servoconnectors, eight Pmod connectors (5 x 12-pin, 3 x 6-pin) for use with peripheral modules or Page 13.738.4devices. It also is compact in size, 4.3” x 2.8

Conference Session

Project-Based Learning in ECE Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Peter Schubert, Packer Engineering; Matthew Beatty, Naperville North High School

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

Page 13.664.2devices designed, constructed, and tested by student researchers.Nearly the entire lunar surface is covered with a gritty dust called regolith.This sand-like substance has been created by billions of years of meteoritebombardment, and covers the lunar bedrock to depths ranging from 0.5 to4 meters, except on cliff walls. The topmost layer is extremely fine, withan average particle size of 0.07 mm (see image to right), and a porosity ofabout 37%. With increasing depth, regolith becomes more compacted andcontains larger aggregates.The elemental composition of regolith is shown in Figure 1. Note that iron comprises about 1/8thof the soil by weight, mostly in the form of ferric oxide, ilmenite and olivine where it is stronglybound to

Conference Session

ECE Poster Session

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

L. Brent Jenkins

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

insists that the 32"mC 10 mA."current in its branch is 10 mA. Such perspectivesprovide useful intuition about circuit behavior ingeneral, but they are especially useful when (b)discussing source combination or sourceneutralization. Figure 1: Ideal Source BehaviorSource CombinationThe selfish nature of ideal sources provides amemorable explanation about why it is 32"mCimpossible to combine non-identical ideal 2V 3Vvoltage sources in parallel or non-identical idealcurrent sources in series. In Figure 2a, the left 37"mCsource

Conference Session

Laboratory Development in ECE Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Bruce Dunne, Grand Valley State University; Melvin Cooke, GE Aviation

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

SA6027 and PLL-based FM demodulation using the LM565C8. The communicationsboard also includes the ability to jumper around sections of the circuitry, or to add inadditional circuitry if desired.Communications Board CircuitryThe communications board block diagram is shown in Figure 1. As shown in the figure,there are two modulation/demodulation blocks for each of AM and FM, along withsupport circuitry for filtering, summing and buffering. In order to allow a variety ofexperiments, the blocks can be configured in various permutations using simple jumpers.It is assumed that the user supplies the carrier signal and the message (information)signal, while using bench equipment to sense and display output signals. These input andoutput signals are

Conference Session

New Trends in ECE Education II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Aleksandr Panchul, UTSA; David Akopian, UTSA

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

Development of Educational Applications for SmartphonesAbstractCell phones are one of most ubiquitous portable technology devices available. New services areadded almost every day and cellular telephony became a bright example of co-evolution ofhuman societies and new information technology.This paper presents a study of using this widely available platform for educational purposes,specifically for digital signal and image processing (DSP/DIP) education. While cell phones arealready used for different educational purposes they were not used for DSP and DIP which arefundamental disciplines in electrical and computer engineering.The following learning and technology goals are addressed. (1) An educational software toolboxfor cell-phones is developed

Conference Session

Innovations in ECE Education II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Alyssa Magleby, University of Utah; Cynthia Furse, University of Utah

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

descriptions of what content should be included as well as step-by-step instructions on how to format the reports, as seen in Figure 1 and Figure 2 . These werefound to be an excellent resource to help students understand the format and content that areexpected for lab reports, and also provide a consistent format to make grading easier for TAs.We observed that when students are given a template, they immediately download the template,and begin using it. This was not necessarily true of instructions! By combining the instructionsinto the template, the students had to delete the instructions (hopefully reading them in theprocess) before typing their own work. This practice is being used for many professionaltemplates, including those for this ASEE

Conference Session

ECE Poster Session

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Steve Dworzecki; Syed Masud Mahmud

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

emissions, and we still had all of the wiring from power windows, doors, and other systems.In this scenario, just as shown in Figure 1, the Electronic Control Unit (ECU) in the car wouldneed to be directly connected to all devices it would interface with. This would include analogor digital connections to every sensor it would be processing. With dedicated links betweenevery processing control center and their external devices, massive amounts of wiring wereneeded in addition to ever growing wiring harness sizes to accommodate these wires. This notonly increases the cost of the vehicle, but adds a noticeable amount of weight to the vehicle. Figure 1: Simplified control network for average automobile without CAN.CAN eschews this structure

Conference Session

Innovations in ECE Education I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Gisele Ragusa, University of Southern California; Michael Khoo, University of Southern California; Ellis Meng, University of Southern California

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

the role of engineering in society1 calling for changes in the wayuniversities address the engineering profession and education. Page 13.505.2There have been many national level studies about critical issues facing the nation about thecrisis in engineering education.1 With outsourcing and offshore presence of engineering jobs,there is a growing concern about the level of interest among students choosing engineering field.While the number of engineering graduates per year has remained steady at about 70,000 in theUnited States, in the past decade the number of engineering graduates per year from China andIndia has grown at a significant rate

Conference Session

ECE Pedagogy and Assessment I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Tokunbo Ogunfunmi, Santa Clara University

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

of Digital Signal Processing (DSP) in most universities has grown rapidly over the last30 years or so. Since one of the most popular original DSP textbooks [1] was written andpublished in 1975, there has been a tremendous growth in the area measured by the number oftextbooks published in the area [2-10] plus other books and recent focus [11-12]. This growth isfueled largely by growth in the semiconductor industry which has enabled more and moretransistors to be fitted on smaller and smaller silicon chips. Another reason for the growth inDSP is the growth in application areas where this technology continues to be used such aswireless communications, networking, bio-informatics, consumer electronics, etc. As suggestedby industry watchers [13

Conference Session

Laboratory Development in ECE Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Peter Mark Jansson, Rowan University; Ulrich Schwabe, Rowan University; Andrew Hak, Rowan University

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

Conergy 1 175 watt Photovoltaic Modules 17,160 S – 175 MU UL 1703 SMA SCCB12 2 DC Combiner Boxes 130 NEMA 3R/4 3 Lightning Arrestors 130 Delta LA602 Square D 4 DC Disconnects 79 HU363RB NEMA 3R UL98

Conference Session

Embedded System Design

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Daren Wilcox, Southern Polytechnic State University; Steve Wilson, Southern Polytechnic State University; Gerd Wöstenkühler

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

AC 2008-2811: EMBEDDED DESIGN IN A SOPHOMORE COURSEDaren Wilcox, Southern Polytechnic State University 1100 South Marietta Parkway Marietta, Georgia 30060-2896, USA +1 678-915-7269 dwilcox@spsu.eduSteve Wilson, Southern Polytechnic State University 1100 South Marietta Parkway Marietta, Georgia 30060-2896, USA +1 678-915-7246 swilson3@spsu.eduGerd Wostenkuhler, Hochschule Harz (University of Applied Studies and Research) Friedrichstraße 57-59 D-38855 Wernigerode, Germany +49 3943 659-322 gwoestenkuehler@hs-harz.de Page 13.480.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2008

Conference Session

Embedded System Design

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Alex Doboli, State University of New York-Stony Brook; Eddie Currie, Resonance Publications, Inc.; Patrick Kane, Cypress Semiconductor Corporation; Dave Van Ess, Cypress Semiconductor Corporation

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

, conclusions are provided.2. Developing New Teaching Material on Embedded Mixed-signal SystemsThe course material focuses on the development of mixed-signal embedded applications thatutilize Systems On Chip (SoC) technology. The course discusses design issues, such as (i)implementing new functionality, (ii) developing new interfacing capabilities, and (iii) improvingperformance by programming the embedded microcontroller and customizing the reconfigurableanalog and digital hardware of the SoC. Prerequisites for the course include introductory coursesin computer programming, digital design and analog circuits, e.g., OpAmps.1 The case study of the encryption algorithm is presented in The International Data Encryption Algorithm by B.Schneier, Other

Conference Session

Design in the ECE Curriculum

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Mihaela Radu, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology; Clint Cole, Washington State University, Pullman; Mircea Alexandru Dabacan, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Romania; Shannon Sexton, Rose Hulman Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

path unit (vi) understanding the importance of functional verification, implementing testing strategies using an HDL based test bench and interpreting the results. (vii) understanding the architectures of different Programmable Logic Devices The present format of the ECE 333- Digital Systems course includes 3 lectures and 3 hours oflaboratory per week, during 10 weeks, in a quarter formats. Detailed information about thecourse can be found in reference 3. Laboratory experiments include use of discrete CMOS logic(1 lab session), programmable GAL ICs (2 lab sessions), programmable logic boards based onXilinx FPGA Spartan 3 chip (2 lab sessions and a 3 week project) and 2 lab sessions dedicated toanalog

Conference Session

New Trends in ECE Education I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sanjay Raman, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Da Silva Luiz, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Masoud Agah, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Allen MacKenzie, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Christopher Maxey, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Amy Bell, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

Engineering, Computer Engineering, and Computer Science.Three-hundred and fifty to four hundred (350-400) students typically enroll in this course onan annual basis.The innovative aspect of the new version of this course is its focus on real-world problemsthat benefit society; a major objective of this course revision is to increase student motivation,satisfaction, and retention in the electrical/electronics and computer related majors, includinga significant impact on the underrepresentation of women and minorities in these majors atVirginia Tech. The importance of hands-on, team-based projects and societal impact has beenwell documented through service-learning-based programs at Colorado and Purdue [1][2].An additional goal is to provide integrated

Conference Session

Innovations in ECE Education II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Marc McComb, Microchip Technology, Inc.

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

Page 13.950.4configuration bits) and, finally, the counter variable to be incremented.The first part of the lab instructs the student to step through each line of code andobserve the effects on the registers, as shown in the Watch Window. Students areto confirm that the counter variable does increment only on a TMR0 registeroverflow. Next, the debugger’s Stopwatch feature is used to assess the timingcharacteristics of the application firmware. As each feature is introduced, basicoperation and configuration is discussed. The student is to confirm that the TMR0register increments 1:1 with the PIC MCU’s internal instruction clock, using theStopwatch. An equation used to determine the internal instruction clock-cycleperiod is discussed and then

Conference Session

Project-Based Learning in ECE Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Albert Liddicoat, California Polytechnic State University; Jianbiao Pan, California Polytechnic State University; James Harris, California Polytechnic State University; Lynne Slivovsky, California Polytechnic State University

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

-levelengineers. Globalization combined with economic pressures has increased the competition forentry level engineering jobs and therefore it is even more important to prepare our engineeringgraduates with all of the skills needed to be productive members of an engineering team.The challenges associated with preparing engineering graduates for professional practice throughan undergraduate curriculum based on theory and analysis is widely acknowledged.1-3 It hasbecome clear that project-based learning with open-ended design projects facilitates self-directedlearning and enhances students’ project management and communication skills. Typical projectsspan multiple academic terms, during which time students gain invaluable experience applyingand

Conference Session

Innovations in ECE Education II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Yakov Cherner, ATeL, LLC; Amin Karim, DeVry University; Ahmed Khan, DeVry University; Victor Rubanchik, Southern Federal University (Russia); Gary Mullett, Springfield Technical Community College

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

facilitate the kind of “deep learning” elements introduced earlier in thispaper.The virtual laboratories implement technologies that can provide instructional opportunities inmany ways, whether at a campus or school (traditional teaching), at home (warm-ups, post-classtasks, or self-learning), in a corporate setting, or through distance learning. ATeL’s realisticsimulations (enable learners to: (1) Observe the physical processes insightfully at different levels of detail (2) Analyze constraints between relevant parameters (3) Push these parameters beyond normal allowed values to simulate infrequent operating conditions or casualty situations (4) Run “what if” scenarios (5) Acquire data from virtual experiments for detailed