M. T. Chew

Robotics competitions in engineering eduction

Internationally engineering education has had to become more pro-active in attracting students with the technical knowledge, skills and motivation enabling them to excel in four or more years of study with the ultimate goal of addressing the ever-growing demand for qualified engineers from the industry. General public perceptions that engineering is a difficult career field while offering inadequate financial rewards as compared to alternative fields have resulted in significant reduction in student numbers, particularly among high quality students across all the engineering, sciences and technical disciplines. This paper presents the experience of using robotic competition events to motivate school students and help them appreciate what is involved in an engineering design and development fields.

Project-Based Learning in Robotics and Electronics in Undergraduate Engineering Program Setting

Aiming to better prepare engineering graduates for challenges of practical real-world engineering job, the Department of Electrical and Computer Systems Engineering and the School of Engineering of Monash University in Robotics and Electronics have jointly introduced several teaching units (subjects) solely based on a team project learning approach. This paper presents and discusses one of them - the third-year Engineering Design unit. It is based on a team project work covering such areas as Robotics, Electrical and Electronic design, Sensing, Instrumentation and Measurement, Computing, Communications, as well as Project Management, Report Writing, Technical Presentation and Robotics Competition.

Distributed sensors for hazard detection in an urban search and rescue operation

Urban search and rescue is a dangerous and difficult task. The amount of information required to mount a rescue is staggering. This coupled with the time constraints of a rescue operation, mean that decisions are sometimes made without all the facts. Gas leaks or structural weaknesses put everyone in danger and can be difficult to detect without being in the environment itself. Robots can penetrate these disaster zones much more easily than humans or dogs and can detect unseen hazards like gas or radiation or can relay images of structural supports. By using robots we can quickly increase the amount of information available to first responders and help them make informed decisions that see more lives saved. The research at Massey University aims to build a system that will provide, amongst other features, a distributed sensor network that can monitor environmental factors and report them to the rescue team. This paper outlines the concept of these sensors, or Daughters, and the results of the tests on the sensors implemented.

An Intelligent Warehouse Stock Management and Tracking System Based on Silicon Identification Technology and 1-Wire Network Communication

This paper presents a novel electronic system for stock control and container tracking in a storage warehouse environment. The system is based on the use of advanced electronic identification tags and 1-Wire communication tools. Each warehouse container is affixed with a small electronic ID tag (called iButton). The tag is an electronic chip housed in a durable 16mm button-shaped stainless steel package (micro-can). The chip provides a unique ID number, read-write memory and 1-Wire interface communication circuitry. It is powered by a long lasting internal battery. The tag keeps information on storage loading/unloading history, goods contents, ownership, etc. Another iButton identified as location tag is placed at each and every storage cell. Once a container is placed into an available storage cell, the pair of ID tags (on the container and in the cell) appeared immediately on the 1-Wire communication network, hence allowing the central controller (PC) to update the latest space utilization and the container/stock associated with it. This intelligent way of tagging the containers with their particular contents to any available storage cells, offers a new alternative to the conventional storage and stock management system where a particular container must be placed into its pre-specified storage space.

Simple mobile robots for introduction into engineering

The demand for qualified engineering professionals in the modern world is far exceeding their supply by higher educational institutions and this gap continues to grow. It is important to attract new students into the area of engineering in order to redress the situation. To address the problem, the universities and institutions of tertiary technical education have to embark on energetic outreach programs aiming to develop interest amongst secondary and high school students to study engineering. Staff-guided student activities leading to design, implementation and application of entry-level robotic devices and systems has proven to be amongst the most efficient elements of such programs.

Electrical Power Monitoring System Using Thermochron Sensor and 1-Wire Communication Protocol

Maintaining quality and reliability of operation of remotely located electrical machines as well as power supply equipment by monitoring their load is an important task in modern practical electrical engineering. This paper presents a low-cost efficient, robust and relatively simple load monitoring electronic system based on the use of special encapsulated temperature sensors-data loggers (so-called Thermochron iButtons) combined with application of 1-wire data communications implemented on the power supply line, dedicated data communication line with off-line data transfer.

Application of a commodity smartphone for fall detection

This paper presents a low-cost fall detection solution based on the use of a commodity smartphone. By collecting, processing and analyzing in real-time signals collected from the smartphone built-in sensors (tri-axis accelerometer and tri-axis gyroscope), the device is able to differentiate a genuine fall occurrence from routine motions of normal daily activities. This enables to generate an immediate alert to a caretaker (such as healthcare personnel, a family member or helper) if a monitored person falls.

Eye tracking system to detect driver drowsiness

This paper describes an eye tracking system for drowsiness detection of a driver. It is based on application of Viola Jones algorithm and Percentage of Eyelid Closure (PERCLOS). The system alerts the driver if the drowsiness index exceeds a pre-specified level.

Mobile robots in the engineering education setting

Demand for engineering graduates is steadily growing around the world. Attracting more students into engineering has become a task of an emerging importance. Mobile robotics is an excellent tool to fascinate young boys and girls while drawing their interests to such fields as mechanical, electrical, electronic, control and computer engineering. It also allows keeping and further developing this interest during the years of study. This paper presents low- to medium-complexity autonomous mobile robots that could be directly employed at school and university levels to introduce to engineering or be used as platforms for further development by the students.

Vision inspection system for pharmaceuticals

This paper presents a low cost automatic inspection system aimed at monitoring of the quality of pharmaceutical products on a production line. The system is built around a smart camera and custom designed LabVIEW based software. It is capable of detecting multiple defects of various types.