Mechatronics Engineering is a relatively new discipline that integrates mechanical, electrical and electronic, and computer engineering systems. It is used to design ‘smart’ products, processes and systems in the likes of aircraft, dishwashers, toys, motor vehicles, automated manufacturing plants, medical and surgical devices, robots of all types and artificial organs. Almost everywhere you look, you will see a Mechatronic system.
“My wife and I just want to give something back to places where we have discovered more about the meaning of life, and encourage and inspire younger generation.”
The prizes are available to BE(Hons) students at each of the three professional years of the programme and promote learning through creativity and innovation.
They are awarded for:
- 2nd year: The best-performing student in the Elevator and Line Following Robot projects. The Elevator project requires students to programme a Logic Controller to control a scale model of a university elevator. The Line Following Robot project is also for second year students. It gives them a taste of open-ended design allowing their creative side to come through. The students need to devise a sensing strategy, construct custom printed circuit boards, and 3-D printed housings to control their robots.
- 3rd year: The best-performing student in the RoboCup, a group project. Groups have two semesters to design and build an autonomous wheeled robot to drive around an arena, picking up objects. The project culminates with a competition between the groups in the class to determine the 'best' robot. This project brings together all the aspects of mechatronics that the students have been learning in their courses and gives them some practical experience applying their technical skills, but is also great for learning about working in teams, the importance of communication, and is a chance to exercise their creativity.
- 4th year: The student performing best in the final year design project. This is an industry-funded project where students work in teams of four to solve an industry problem.
Professor Chen said Mechatronics graduates are much sought after by employers, and many have progressed well to PhD studies in more specialised research areas.
“It is also common that mechatronics graduates are very enterprising in technology innovation and uptake, such as the UC spin-off Invert Robotics.”
Professor Chris Pretty, Co-Director of Mechatronics at UC, said the programme is proving very popular.
“When I started working at UC in 2013, there were 30-40 students per year group in mechatronics. Numbers have grown fairly rapidly since then and we now have around 120 for each year group.”
Although now based at South China University of Technology Guangzhou International Campus, Professor Chen still keenly follows the UC Mechatronics programme, including continuous improvements that the current team is making.
“I’m pleased to see that it is going from strength to strength. One thing I am looking into is the opportunity of a joint course offering between UC and South China University of Technology.”
Professor Chen leads a team of young academics delivering two new engineering programmes in intelligent manufacturing engineering and robotics engineering, and conducting research in extreme manufacturing, safe and intelligent robots, smart healthcare and device, and intelligent connected vehicles.
They collaborate closely with the UC team on mechatronics innovations for equitable healthcare.
