A Bottom-Up Approach to Teaching Robotics and Mechatronics to Mechanical Engineers

This paper describes a multidisciplinary teaching program, designed to provide students with the broad knowledge and skills required to practice product development in robotics and mechatronics. The curriculum was designed to prepare students for the senior capstone design project, in which they design and build a working mechatronic/robotic system. It consists of a basic program in mechanical engineering, augmented with courses and laboratories in electronics, microprocessors, control, and computer programming. The early introduction of the specialty courses and the ample hands-on experience offered in the accompanying laboratories allows students to gain intuitive understanding of concepts that are usually foreign to mechanical engineers. The capstone design project attracts students to the program and serves as a beacon for the entire program. The program is now in its 11th year, receiving positive feedback from students and graduates.

I. Introduction

The Field of mechatronics has emerged since the early 1990's as a synergetic integration of mechanics, electronics, control, and computer science [1]–[5]. As product design is becoming increasingly multidisciplinary, requiring the integration of mechanical systems with computer control, the demand for mechatronics engineers who are trained in multidisciplinary system integration is expected to increase [6], [7]. In response to this anticipated demand, many mechanical engineering programs worldwide have offered minors in mechatronics [8]–[14]. Typically, the core of such minors consists of a few specialty courses designed to integrate the fields of mechanics, electronics, and computing in a capstone design project [15]–[17]. Some programs justifiably emphasize the role of mechanical design in the Mechatronics minor [18], [19] since it is only through the construction of a working mechanical system that the students can demonstrate and appreciate the true power of system integration.