Engineering Design Cycle Research Articles

The Importance of Students’ Practical Work in High Schools for Higher Education in Electronic Engineering

Contribution: Impact assessment of the practice-oriented course for high school students on their later academic achievements, described in the context of long-term efforts to improve electronic engineering studies’ quality. The article highlights the importance of outreach and extracurricular activities and cooperation with the IEEE in these efforts. Background: Faced with the practical application of theoretical knowledge, either in laboratory exercises or on small projects, students are not as successful as expected. A high school course promoting practical work has been developed, following the gathered experience and results from other studies. The intention was to track participants’ progress not only on the course but also during their later studies at the faculty. Intended Outcomes: Increased the number of proficient high school students enrolling in the university. Improved quality of papers at student conferences, organization of workshops and events attractive to students and educators, an increased number of young members of the IEEE. Impact on the policymakers. Application Design: In tailoring the course content, the goal was to mimic an engineering design cycle through project-based learning. In contrast to deductive learning, which students were accustomed to, assessment-based and active learning teaching strategies, such as think–pair–share, practical demonstrations through performance tasks, and homework practice, have been used. Findings: This research documents that students with practical experience in high school have more self-confidence and better university scores than those with none. The universities should step forward in initiatives to strengthen connections with high schools and professional societies.

Case Studies of Two Exemplar Engineering-Focused Elementary Schools

Abstract As the prevalence of integrated STEM education increases worldwide, some elementary schools in the United States have converted their programs to be more STEM-focused. This study examines the practices of two highly regarded STEM-focused elementary schools that focus on engineering education. The resulting case studies of the school explain their engineering programming, teacher professional development, and the way they situate growth mindset to integrate an engineering design process across content areas. These schools have successfully sustained the integration of engineering education by partnering with engineers and engineering educators outside of the school, providing a conducive environment for teacher collaboration, and enhance growth mindset for the school community by using the lens of engineering design. Administrators, teachers, and students all used an engineering design cycle to learn and solve problems. The systems found at these schools have the potential be transferred into other school settings wanting to amplify their STEM offerings.

Evaluation of STEM Applications Used in Science Education

Bu araştırmanın amacı 2014-2020 yılları arasında yayınlanan ve STEM (Science,Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) uygulamalarının kullanıldığı ampirik çalışmalarınincelenmesidir. Bu kapsamda yurt içinde yayınlamış ve fen eğitiminde STEMuygulamalarını içeren araştırmalar taranmıştır. Tarama, Tübitak ULAKBİM, DergiPark veGoogle Scholar adreslerinde, “STEM uygulamaları”, “STEM etkinlikleri”, “STEMatölye”“FeTeMM” ve“FeTeMM uygulamaları” anahtar kelimeleri ile yapılmıştır. Belirlenen dahiletme ve hariç tutma kriterleri doğrultusunda 40 çalışmanın incelenmesine karar verilmiştir.Araştırmanın amacına uygun çalışmalar incelenmek üzere sınıflandırılmıştır. Ardındançalışmalar yöntem, yayın yılı, örneklem grubu, uygulamalarda kullanılan araç-gereçler,uygulamalarda kullanılan öğretim modeli ve STEM uygulamalarının etkisinin araştırıldığıbağımlı değişkenler açısından incelenmiştir. Fen eğitiminde STEM uygulamalarınınkullanıldığı ampirik çalışmaların son yıllarda artış gösterdiği belirlenmiştir. Çalışmalardabüyük oranda nitel araştırma yöntemlerinin tercih edildiği görülmektedir. Öne çıkan diğerbir bulgu ise STEM uygulamaları ile gerçekleştirilen çalışmalarda büyük oranda kolayulaşılabilir laboratuvar malzemelerinin kullanılmış olmasıdır. Bununla birlikte teknolojitabanlı robotik uygulamaların kullanımının az olduğu ve tercih edilen robotikuygulamalarının ise birkaç programla sınırlı olduğu ulaşılan diğer bir bulgudur. STEMuygulamalarında tercih edilen öğretim modelinde ise mühendislik tasarım döngüsününsıkça tercih edildiği belirlenmiştir. STEM uygulamaları ile öğrencilerin akademik başarı,bilimsel süreç becerileri, problem çözme becerileri, motivasyon, öz yeterlilik algıları, ilgi vetutumlarında olumlu etkilere sahip olduğu belirlenmiştir. STEM uygulamalarının feneğitiminde daha yaygın kullanımı için rehber uygulama kılavuzlarının oluşturulması yararlıolacaktır. Fen eğitimi için STEM entegrasyonunun yaygınlaştırılması önerilmektedir

Supporting pre-service teachers’ integration of engineering into STEM lessons throughout engineering-infused training

ABSTRACT Background Training both pre – and in-service teachers who are capable of planning and enacting engineering design–based science instruction are critical for integrating engineering into K-12 science curricula. Purpose This study investigates pre-service teachers’ efforts to integrate engineering into their lesson plans. Sample 13 pre-service chemistry teachers, enrolled in a 13-week engineering-infused integrated STEM course, were the participants of the study. Design and Method Considering the purpose of the study, qualitative design was deemed to be the best fit including qualitative data collected through lesson plans and reflection papers. To assist pre-service teachers’ learning, 13-week engineering-infused integrated STEM was started with the information about the engineering profession and how engineers work. Additionally, pre-service teachers engaged in six integrated STEM activities including engineering design cycle. After each activity, the participants were asked to write a reflection paper on what they learned about engineering, the engineering design process, and integrated STEM. Finally, the participants had three chances for analyzing strong and weak integrated STEM lesson plans and planning integrated STEM lesson planning experience with mentors. The pre-and post-course lesson plans (n=26) were analyzed using existing codes from the related literature, which is a deductive coding process. Later, an inductive approach was used to determine the categories of engineering integration into the lesson plans. Four categories (ranging from a complete engineering lesson to a science lesson with no engineering link) were formed. Reflection papers were used to support the findings. Result The results showed that none of the pre-plans included engineering. However, after participated in a 13-week integrated STEM course, all post-course lesson plans integrated engineering through the use of engineering design processes to some extent. Conclusion The training with different experiences seems promising for pre-service teachers to learn engineering integration into STEM lesson plans.

Exploring caregiver influence on child creativity and innovation in an out-of-school engineering program

Creativity is of increasing importance to the field of engineering. Thus, furthering our understanding of the development of (or barriers to) creativity during childhood and adolescence, and in environments alternative to traditional classroom settings, may hold particular significance and implications for generating creative and cognitive shifts amongst children, and their ultimate interest in the discipline. Constraints on child creative thinking and innovation that may occur by educators and within schools highlight the need to explore alternative environments and individuals, such as caregivers and/or out-of-school contexts. To expand our understanding of the influence caregivers may have on child creativity and innovation, particularly during the critical engineering design phases of problem identification and solution ideation, this study sought to investigate how caregiver involvement shapes the creativity and innovation of children in an out-of-school engineering program. Using conversation analysis to examine caregiver-child dialogue, results demonstrate ways that child ideas, creative thinking, and innovative engagement with various solutions were shaped by caregivers’ involvement through four predominant dialogic methods, including (a) directive questioning, (b) restating/reframing, (c) idea blending, and (d) using shared experiences. Insights into specific dialogic methods caregivers employed while engaging with children in out-of-school environments through the engineering design cycle are discussed, further illuminating how such engagement and specific conversational tactics impact children's creative thinking and use of innovation. In so doing, we support the argument that the nature of caregiver engagement and the fostering or hindering of creativity and innovation through conversation ultimately influences children's own engagement and application of engineering concepts

Connecting engineering design and inquiry cycles: Impact on elementary preservice teachers' engineering efficacy and perspectives toward teaching engineering

AbstractEngineering has become increasingly prominent in science education, with documents such as Next Generation Science Standards detailing the importance of introducing students at all grade levels to science and engineering practices. Yet, many elementary teachers may lack sufficient engineering content and pedagogical knowledge and report feeling unprepared to teach engineering content and processes. To prepare future elementary teachers to teach engineering, two university faculty members in science and mathematics education designed an engineering unit that was incorporated within an elementary science methods course and supported through an elementary mathematics methods course. This unit focused on the engineering design process as well as connections between the work of scientists and engineers; the processes of science, engineering, and mathematics; and the cycles of engineering design and inquiry. The results of the study provide evidence that the unit had a positive influence on the 27 preservice teacher participants’ engineering teaching efficacy, understanding of engineering, and comprehension of the implementation of engineering in the elementary classroom.

Architectural design for optimised performance supported by aerospace Value Assessment methods

This paper focuses on novel interdisciplinary design methodologies between architecture and aerospace engineering in support of drastic required changes for the construction of genuinely resilient and sustainable buildings. Current design and construction methods are rarely truly interdisciplinary; driven by successive development stages as opposed to holistic system views capable of integrating valuable feedback loops into the design process and whole life cycle stages of a building. We address these deficiencies by integrating two methods that have been successfully tested independently. Firstly, the “Virtual Design Studio” (VDS) approach that focuses on holistic architectural design processes, initially funded by the US Department of Energy at Syracuse University and the New York State Center of Excellence for Energy and Environmental Systems. Secondly, the Value Assessment (VA) methodology supported by Visual Analytics in aerospace engineering design cycles, initially funded by the European Commission FP7 through the TOICA project and currently funded by Innovate UK through the APROCONE project, and developed by the Engineering Design Centre at the University of Cambridge.

Enabling the Advanced Bioeconomy through Public Policy Supporting Biofoundries and Engineering Biology

The bioeconomy concept is proliferating globally. However, the enabling roles of biotechnology may be getting sidelined in the strategies of some countries. A goal for engineering biology is alignment with the engineering design cycle to enable more rapid commercialization. This paper considers several policy options to remove critical technical barriers to commercialization.

Design and Research of Electronic Switch based on Proteus Circumstance

At present, most of the electronic switches used have single function, raise voltage or reduce voltage, and also have step-up and step-down, it has the step-up and step-down function, but the circuit structures simple is not much. In this paper, an electronic switch which can replace the step-up and step-down circuits is designed. Three different levels of step-up, step-down and constant voltage are designed through voltage gain, the circuit solves the problem that the original small and medium power circuit can only step-up or can reduce the voltage, and realizes the function that the same circuit can not only boost the voltage but also realize the step-down function, and meets the requirement of continuous and adjustable power. Through the simulation and calculation results verify the feasibility and correctness of the design, and provide convenience for users, especially in the use of small and medium power. The voltage gain can be adjusted precisely according to the requirement, so that the voltage can reach the exact voltage value that can be adjusted continuously, thus shortening the engineering design cycle and the R & D process.

Between the Social and the Technical: Negotiation of Human-Centered Robotics Design in a Middle School Classroom

This paper presents a middle school human-centered robotics (HCR) learning experience and the ways in which it supported students’ orientation to technical and social aspects of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). The interdisciplinary project associated with this analysis aims to engage diverse students in authentic STEM practices by creating robotic technologies that can assist people in their school, and connect with remote peers. The goal of this project is to increase student interest in and knowledge of STEM topics, and to help students recognize STEM as relevant to their daily lives and broader societal issues. The human-centered focus of the curriculum encouraged thinking from multiple perspectives (e.g. design, social science, programming) and allowed for diverse STEM exploration. We present samples from student work and classroom interactions. These samples show challenges and successes in engaging students with STEM as a combination of social and technical questions and skills. We trace the trajectory of one group’s work to highlight moments in which students navigated an engineering design cycle, analyzed and designed social environments, and crossed disciplinary domains through HCR design—using a phenomena, mechanisms, components framework (PMC) to explore systems thinking. Phenomena refers to attention to the function of the robotic technology in the classroom environment. Components included a focus on single parts of the robot, while mechanism addressed how parts of the robot worked together. This qualitative case study demonstrates the capacity social robotics and inquiry-based learning experiences hold for broadening notions of STEM as a social and multidisciplinary learning domain.

Product Planning techniques: investigating the differences between research trajectories and industry expectations

According to several literature sources, Product Planning is acknowledged as a primary driver of future commercial success for new designed products, and it is schematically constituted by the identification of business opportunities and the selection of most promising alternatives. Despite the recalled relevance of Product Planning, it emerges that a marginal quantity of companies have adopted formal methods to carry out this task. The paper attempts to provide a major understanding about such a limited implementation of Product Planning techniques and other open issues emerging from the analysis of the literature concerning the initial phases of engineering design cycles. The presented study investigates the claimed benefits of methods described in the literature, the level to which such tools are diffused through educational programs in Technical Institutes, the expectations and the demands of a sample of enterprises with respect to new tools supporting Product Planning. It emerges that, whereas existing methods strive to fulfil relevant properties according to the perception of the companies, limitations come out in terms of the transfer of the proposed techniques and their perceived reliability.

Developing An Engineering Identity In Early Childhood

This project describes a strategy to introduce young children to engineering in a way that develops their engineering identity. The targeted age group is 3-7 year old students because they rarely experience purposeful engineering instruction. The curriculum was designed around an engineering storybook and included interactive academic discussions as well as a creative drawing activity. Results provide evidence that students developed an engineering identity based on their illustrations of themselves working as engineers. These findings lend support to the use of engineering-centered books to improve the impact of instructional strategies that emphasize the engineering design cycle. We show how both the curricular materials and the activities can work together to develop an engineering identity in this age group.

An original design approach for stimulating the ideation of new product features

The manuscript illustrates a method, implemented in a computer application, which supports the identification of new product features in the early phases of engineering design cycles. In the practice, such a task is commonly carried out through cognitive techniques that generate random and unstructured stimuli. These approaches and the computer-aided tools that implement them suffer from a scarce exploration of the design space. This criticality is faced by introducing an original classification of value drivers, thus organizing a large set of concepts consisting of stimuli for generating new product ideas. The proposed method combines the concepts belonging to different categories of the classification in order to identify scenarios in which the product can provide unprecedented benefits for customers and other stakeholders. Experiments in academia and industry show the capability of the developed method and prototype software to increase the number and the novelty of ideas, reveal previously overlooked drivers for customer satisfaction and enhance the definition of stimulated design requirements.

Engineered cell-based therapies: a vanguard of design-driven medicine.

Engineered cell-based therapies are uniquely capable of performing sophisticated therapeutic functions in vivo, and this strategy is yielding promising clinical benefits for treating cancer. In this review, we discuss key opportunities and challenges for engineering customized cellular functions using cell-based therapy for cancer as a representative case study. We examine the historical development of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) therapies as an illustration of the engineering design cycle. We also consider the potential roles that the complementary disciplines of systems biology and synthetic biology may play in realizing safe and effective treatments for a broad range of patients and diseases. In particular, we discuss how systems biology may facilitate both fundamental research and clinical translation, and we describe how the emerging field of synthetic biology is providing novel modalities for building customized cellular functions to overcome existing clinical barriers. Together, these approaches provide a powerful set of conceptual and experimental tools for transforming information into understanding, and for translating understanding into novel therapeutics to establish a new framework for design-driven medicine.

Redesigning the Water Rocket: An Engineering-Design Cycle for Integrating Science and Engineering Practices and Nature of Science Learning

Redesigning the Water Rocket: An Engineering-Design Cycle for Integrating Science and Engineering Practices and Nature of Science Learning

The impact of synthetic biology in chemical engineering—Educational issues

This paper describes the development of synthetic biology as a distinct entity from current industrial biotechnology and the implications for a future based on its concepts. The role of the engineering design cycle, in synthetic biology is established and the difficulties in making and exact analogy between the two emphasised. It is suggested that process engineers can offer experience in the application of synthetic biology to the manufacture of products which should influence the approach of the synthetic biologist. The style of teaching for synthetic biology appears to offer a new approach at undergraduate level and the challenges to the education of process engineers in this technology are raised. Possible routes to the development of synthetic biology teaching are suggested.

DESIGNING EVALUATION INTO OPEN-ENDED DESIGN LABS

Open-ended design problems are an important part of engineering education. Balanced with this is the requirement for effective evaluation within a limited amount of time. As with concurrent engineering, parallel development of the components is required - in this case, the design lab and its evaluation. The implemented approach uses the engineering design cycle as a lab development template. To facilitate evaluation, the lab document has been designed to require students to clearly complete and document the engineering design cycle. This paper looks at the lab development process, evaluation results from a sample of graded labs, and feedback results.

Assessing K–12 outreach

Abstract

A Novel Phototherapy Device

Phototherapy is the standard treatment for severe cases of hyperbilirubinemia in newborns. Phototherapy exposes the infants to light in the range of 400-500 nm to isomerize unconjugated bilirubin in the skin. Any light source that produces this wavelength can be used, including the sun (though there is a risk of sunburn), fluorescent or halogen lamps, or, more recently, light-emitting diodes. Despite the well-established efficacy of phototherapy devices and their relative simplicity-being not much more than a floor lamp-phototherapy devices are too expensive for developing world hospitals to purchase, with typical hospital models ranging from US$3,000 to US$5,000. In addition, the resource-poor setting presents a more challenging engineering problem than most. Phototherapy devices are frequently donated to developing world hospitals. However, donated phototherapy devices typically run for no more than a few months once donated and, even then, offer little value to some hospitals. Given this background, we set out to design a phototherapy device specifically for use in the developing world. As a minimum, we knew that it had to have a light source with an extraordinarily long life span and have battery backup so that it could run during frequent power outages. Our design uses LEDs and is powered by a car or motorcycle battery. In this article, we present the full engineering design cycle, staring with needs identification and continuing through several cycles of engineering field trials and results with comments on the differences between the engineering design cycle executed in, and for, the developing world.

Large eddy simulation applications in gas turbines

The gas turbine presents significant challenges to any computational fluid dynamics techniques. The combination of a wide range of flow phenomena with complex geometry is difficult to model in the context of Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) solvers. We review the potential for large eddy simulation (LES) in modelling the flow in the different components of the gas turbine during a practical engineering design cycle. We show that while LES has demonstrated considerable promise for reliable prediction of many flows in the engine that are difficult for RANS it is not a panacea and considerable application challenges remain. However, for many flows, especially those dominated by shear layer mixing such as in combustion chambers and exhausts, LES has demonstrated a clear superiority over RANS for moderately complex geometries although at significantly higher cost which will remain an issue in making the calculations relevant within the design cycle.