On The Road with the National Instruments Campus Bus Tour 2012

Both National Instruments (NI) and Quanser share a strong belief that engineers learn better with hands-on tools. However, not every campus has the latest and greatest hardware and software tools available for students, researchers, and educators to use. So, with that in mind, NI decided to bring the hands-on engineering experience to North American campuses one at a time! The first ever NI LabVIEW™ Campus Tour is currently traveling to universities and colleges across the US and Canada and showcasing the latest tools for engineering education and research, including some of Quanser's hands-on experiments.

The NI LabVIEW™ Campus Tour is a 4-station "Lab On Wheels" visiting scores of North American college campuses throughout 2012 and 2013.

I had the opportunity to travel along with the Campus Tour bus last week through the midwest United States - road trip! I spent as much time teaching visitors about Quanser's education solutions as I did learning about the high-tech NI hardware and software tools and how they are applied in engineering research and industry.

At the time I met up with the bus, the tour had already been under way for weeks, travelling each day to a new town to visit as many campuses as possible. I joined up with the bus at Purdue University in Lafayette, Indiana, then on to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and then the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Wisconsin. I wasn't sure whether I would be the rock star or the roadie on this trip, but that's what made it an adventure.

As part of the U.S. Midwest portion of the Campus Tour, the NI LabVIEW™ Tour Bus visited three major universities in three days.

The bus was beyond my expectations. An engineer's dream lab on wheels, the bus had more high-tech toys (i.e. expensive engineering gizmos) than most university labs. You step onto the bus and see benches filled with cutting edge equipment and monitors displaying the programs they are running. One corner of the bus I was already familiar with was the controls section, which featured the Quanser Rotary Inverted Pendulum and the Quanser Active Suspension experiments. Both experiments were hooked up to NI CompactRIO platforms using the new Quanser Q1-cRIO module for data acquisition and connectivity to the plants. LabVIEW™ software was driving the experiments. The visitors were always delighted when I showed them how the inverted pendulum can swing up and balance the pendulum and how the 3D race car visualization is used to bring a real-world dimension to the active suspension system. I think these were successful examples of how engaging hands-on hardware can be used to captivate and motivate students and researchers alike.

The Quanser Controls area is one of four LabVIEW-based stations inside the Tour Bus. On display are the Quanser Rotary Inverted Pendulum and Active Suspension experiments.

Throughout the day, visitors would come on the bus to see all of the four stations: control systems, 3-phase power, civil engineering, and RF communication experiments. The solutions ranged from student-level tools such as the NI MyDAQ and the NI ELVIS experiment platform up to advanced research and industry grade measurement systems running on the NI PXI computer platforms. So there was something for everyone on board. What I found really interesting was the large spectrum of engineering applications covered by LabVIEW™ and the hardware tools presented. Seeing these demonstrations really makes you feel like with the right tools you can do anything, if you know what you're doing!

Vistors to the Tour Bus spoke with NI field engineers and got a close-up view of LabVIEW™-based demonstrations for teaching and research.

I realized that the campus tour is a lot like a tradeshow or conference, where you have to be part roadie and part rock star. I'm glad I got a chance to go with the tour for a while, not only to demonstrate Quanser equipment and our collaboration with NI, but also to spend time with the NI field engineers and learn more about their solutions for cutting edge engineering. Check out the NI Campus Tour dates for upcoming stops including several Canadian universities this Fall.

Cameron

Real-World Lab Simulations Can "Drive" Students To Success

What happened when Quanser took some of its traditional, time-tested, controls equipment and added a new, motivating application layer of automotive driving simulation? It created a highly engaging controls application called the Quanser Driving Simulator (QDS). It’s like a video game on the surface, but underneath the QDS is a genuine Hardware-in-the-Loop engineering experience in an automotive design context. This is yet another new and creative path Quanser is exploring to engage students immediately and thoroughly. Watch as Quanser’s Chief Education Officer, Tom Lee, explains the QDS concept and a University of Toronto student describes her experience with it in class.

Set Your Research Up For Success

As a professor of engineering, some of the biggest demands on your time are preparing students to graduate with industry-ready engineering skills; and conducting innovative research in your area of expertise.

Versatile, cutting edge tools.  Wherever your interests lie, Quanser’s vast array of tools are designed to rapidly bridge the distance between theory and experiment. We provide mechatronics plants, modular systems and control design tools appropriate for research at all levels.  All are robust, reliable and built to perform.

Our systems consist of open architecture hardware you can use to test your theory while working within your existing lab.  Combined with that is Quanser’s QUARC real-time design software. It enables you to obtain accurate, repeatable results while saving remarkable amounts of research time. 

One such example is found in recent rehab work done by Professor Marcia O'Malley and her team from Rice University in Houston, Texas. To see how Professor O’Malley of Rice University established the promise of her R & D rehab project early on and secured additional funding by using cutting edge Quanser tools, click here.

The RiceWrist is a device designed to help rehabilitate people with spinal-cord injuries. 

Quanser’s rapid prototyping software and control hardware sped the
development of the RiceWrist. Speedy development was instrumental in the project establishing its validity and receiving additional funding. 
Photos courtesy of Prof. Marcia O'Malley

Over 20 years of expertise in controls at your disposal.  From research inception to completion, Quanser engineers are valuable resource persons you can lean on. They’re completely familiar with all our tools because they conceived and built them.  So when graduate students or lab assistants move on, you never lose the continuity of our support.

Our engineers can also aid in the research design or help you choose the components you require to build the best integrated rapid controls framework for your project. So whether it requires months or years, you can rely on Quanser’s ongoing support.

Semesters go by all too quickly and you need to make the most of the all-too-limited research resources available to you. To fully leverage those resources, you may wish to consider the tools, expertise and support available to you from Quanser.  It could be the best way to set up your research for success.

To discuss ways Quanser can help set up your research for success, contact us at info@quanser.com.

How Top Professors Help Their Students Get The Most Out of a Course

Any good controls professor can show his or her students how a controls experiment works.  But a great controls professor accomplishes much, much more. He or she helps their students see why that controls experiment is so valuable in the real world.

As you probably know, not all students come to their first controls class with a clear idea of why controls are so important. That’s why immediately identifying the importance of controls in sustaining our fast-paced daily lives should be one of the first goals of any controls professor.  Students who are presented with this results-oriented vision will then be ready to invest their time and energy in the task of learning the subject matter—simply because they’ll see the real-world applications that lie beyond the experiments and the theory.

These real-world applications are everywhere. They're found in DVD players and cars that parallel park themselves; in medical robotics and industrial production processes; and in all aspects of manned and unmanned flight, to name a few. The more your students are aware of these everyday applications, the more motivated they will be. These practical, real-life applications involve virtually every modern engineering discipline, including electrical, mechanical, biomedical, chemical, aerospace, unmanned systems, civil, robotics and mechatronics. Individually and collectively, they allow your students to engineer a better world.

No less a controls authority than Dr. Mark Spong agrees.  According to Dr. Spong, Dean of the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering & Computer Science, University of Texas at Austin, “The 21^st century will be known as the age of automatic control.”  He elaborates: “Most of the critical problems facing society today, in sustainable energy, healthcare, the environment, security, and other areas, will rely on control engineering for solutions.”

The same holds true in the purely industrial realm, notes Dr. Spong.  “Industry is more and more focusing on embedded controls and sensing.  In the automotive industry, everything is drive by wire now: brakes, engine control, everything is becoming mechatronic in that sense.”

By identifying the real-world significance of the study of controls for your class, you will be able to attract, keep and graduate more and better students. You’ll help them focus on clear, professional goals and motivate them to graduate with industry-ready skills. Now what professor wouldn’t want to get their students ready for opportunities like that?

To see how Dr. Spong worked with Quanser to connect the real world with control theory for his students, click here.

Five Things To Look For When Choosing Lab Equipment

“I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”
     - Confucius (551 – 479 BCE)

These words of wisdom are as relevant today as they were 2500 years ago when they were first written. They reflect the most effective way to teach controls and create the ideal learning environment for your students, especially hands-on experimentation that bridges the gap between theory and practice. Adhering to the following guidelines will help you choose lab equipment wisely and ensure your learning environment will be the best it can be.

Your students will benefit when you provide them with the best possible learning environment.

Hands-on experimentation.  Look for experiments that are created expressly to help your students get practical experience in controls. As an example, our hands-on devices have captivated students for more than 20 years. Interacting with them, students learn fundamental concepts through their senses. This allows students to better assimilate theory and ultimately become creative and well-rounded engineering graduates.

Easy set up.  Setting up a control experiment or a complete lab should be simple and straightforward.  To that end, our labs consist of modular elements and include all the components and peripherals your students will need. Take Quanser's Rotary Servo Control Lab.  All of its available hands-on experiments are designed for quick, repeated assembly and disassembly. Plug and play connectors and provided cables allow students or lab technicians to make fast connections when setting up a control workstation. There is no need to strip wires or solder custom cables. The same is true for all Quanser experiments.

Our Rotary experiments alone you offer over 30 hands-on labs built around a Rotary Servo Base Unit (SRV02).  Nine experimental modules can be added on to the Rotary Servo Base Unit. So your control lab can consist of up to 10 different workstations, each featuring a different module to help students learn introductory, intermediate and advanced control concepts.

Building block courseware.  Another important consideration when choosing lab equipment is the availability of accompanying courseware to teach basic control topics in logical, progressive steps. With each experiment, Quanser provides an array of courseware that can include instructor workbooks, student workbooks, user manuals, laboratory guides and quick start guides. One hands-on experiment builds on another, so students can grasp concepts and then increase their knowledge a step at a time.

Our courseware is designed so you can use it to create your curriculum or supplement it. Either way, you’ll save valuable prep time and be able to spend your classroom hours working with your students at a high level.

A relentless focus on the real world.  We offer you hands-on experiments and building block courseware geared to connect your students to real-life engineering problems.  That's why our Rotary Pendulum experiment teaches classic self-balancing dynamics – the same controls problem that was faced by the inventor of the Segway electric vehicle. Our Rotary Flexible Link experiment introduces students to the kind of flexibility challenge presented to the engineers who designed the Canadarm Shuttle Remote Manipulator System. Our Rotary Gyro/Stable Platform experiment teaches your students about such real-world applications as space satellite orientation.  The list goes on.

Controls applications are crucial to the safe, efficient operation of modern transportation technology.

  

The Rotary Servo experiment teaches concepts integral to such high-precision applications as a CD-ROM drive.

Make the most of a Quanser - National Instruments campus visit. If you live and teach in North America, be sure to check out the National Instruments (NI) LabVIEW™  Campus Tour should it come to your university this fall or spring. This specially-outfitted RV recreational vehicle is taking four NI-based technical workstations that highlight teaching and research applications on the road to 120 universities across North America. The Controls workstation will feature two automated Quanser-NI powered demos: Servo motor with Inverted Pendulum module, and Active Suspension.  For more information and the NI LabVIEW™ Campus Tour schedule, click here.  To discuss any particular challenge and solution you have in your controls courses, contact us at info@quanser.com about having an Academic Solutions Advisor come and meet with you.

Is National Instruments' LabVIEW™ Campus Tour, featuring a NI-Quanser Controls Workstation, coming to your North American campus in 2012 -2013? Check the schedule.

Attracting, retaining students and graduating students are more of a challenge than ever.  One of the best strategies for ensuring you accomplish all three is to provide your students with a learning environment that allows them to move well past theory to the solid understanding that comes from hands-on experience. Confucius would definitely approve.

What Happens in Austin… Gets Posted on a Blog…

Every year, National Instruments (NI) call upon the engineers of the world to gather and celebrate the achievements and potential of engineering, and to honor and perpetuate nerd culture, and to do justice to the folksy mantra, “Keep Austin Weird!”  This annual phenomenon is, of course, NI Week. Quanser has been a long time strategic partner of NI and this year, with no exaggeration, our experience at NI Week 2012 held in August, was the best ever.

Unlike the more scholarly engineering conferences, NI Week is unabashedly festive in tone. Yes, there are plenty of technical sessions where attendees get updates on the latest esoteric tips and tricks on data acquisition. But the true highlights of the conference often erupt during the plenary sessions or even on the exhibits floor. There people have a chance to congregate and channel their “inner Thomas Edison” in a single location.  Quite often, magic seems to happen.

Control visionary Dr. Mark Spong drops by the Quanser Booth during NIWEEK 2012.

This year we showcased several important milestones. The most strategic was the announcement and demonstration of two new exciting products: the Quanser Q1-cRIO DAQ module for the NI Compact RIO platform, and the Quanser Rapid Control Prototyping (RCP) Toolkit software for LabVIEW™. Collectively these products streamline the deployment of even the most ambitious control systems application a lot easier. In their respective ways, these two new products take care of a lot of the cumbersome wiring and I/O software housekeeping that curse most users.

The Quanser Q1-cRIO DAQ module for the NI CompactRIO platform ensures simpler interfacing and faster connectivity. They help students work more efficiently
and focus on learning.

cRIO and LabVIEW have always been excellent tools for a wide range of control systems work but the Q1-cRIO and RCP Toolkit make the NI platform truly complete. In many ways, the combination of NI’s traditional DAQ and instrumentation product line and Quanser’s control-centric product line collectively comprise a market-leading, end-to-end solution for modern control systems education and research.

 

Above: a closed loop controller developed with the Quanser RCP Toolkit. 
This clear visualization bridges the gap between theory and practice and
helps students grasp concepts better.

As important and strategic as these product launches were, the real fun was our presentation of the Quanser Driving Simulator (QDS). We debuted this innovative approach to undergrad control lab experiences earlier this year at the ASEE conference. We reprised this concept as part of the NI Week Academic Forum “sub-conference”. Additionally, we were invited to present and demonstrate QDS as part of the keynote presentation for the Academic Forum.

The tech conference keynote … we’ve all seen iconic footage of Steve Jobs or Bill Gates standing atop a big stage, and with great fanfare, usher in a new vision of one thing or another with huge hyperbolic promises and a jaw-dropping demo. I wasn’t exactly Steve or Bill unfortunately… I look terrible in a turtleneck, and our demo actually worked… but it’s about as close to that as I have ever been. Ably assisted by Quanser “demo jock” Peter Martin, we did our best techno-samba on stage.

On stage at the Academic Forum during NIWEEK 2012: Dave Wilson, NI's Director of Academic Programs; Tom Lee, Quanser's Chief Education Officer; and (partially hidden)
Peter Martin, Quanser's  demo jock and "Human-In-The-Loop", demonstrating
the Quanser Driving Simulator.

Dave Wilson, NI’s Director of Academic Programs and the principal speaker for the keynote, proclaimed “We nailed it!”. Translation: all the demos worked, all the key points were made, the audience laughed at the jokes, even the bad ones, and most importantly, the audience got it.

 

NI President, CEO and Co-founder Dr. James Truchard experiences the Quanser Driving Simulator for himself. Next to him is Quanser Chief Technology Officer and Founder Dr. Jacob Apkarian.

The Quanser message was in many ways a profound statement of what can be done in education with some cleverness and the right tools. The QDS pedagogy introduces a dynamic, motivating application layer persistently through all of the labs in a given course sequence. In this sense, it’s easier for students to relate abstract concepts to the real world and to connect ideas to each other. As an added bonus, the QDS introduces students to the critically important techniques of Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) testing, which have revolutionized modern advanced industry. Unfortunately, as important as HIL is, the conventional curriculum has yet to reconcile the new with the old. QDS offers an efficient path to achieving this.

In 2009, while I was still with Maplesoft, I had the pleasure to be on stage in Austin (ASEE was held there that year), with the then-young Keith Blanchet, Quanser’s Director of Business Development. That was the first time that I had collaborated on a presentation with this weird company called Quanser. You can read the account here. 

A well-seasoned Keith Blanchet impresses some young engineers
with his technological and educational wisdom.

That collaboration actually triggered my interest and eventual explorations into the complex relationships between the physical world and the theoretical world and this exploration lead me to my current job—and back to Austin. If you read between the lines of my previous post, there was a very strong “prescriptive” dimension, i.e., if we do this, the world would be better. Fast forward to last week, when I got the real sense that my words on stage this time around were fundamentally “descriptive”, i.e., we HAVE achieved this and we can see the changes happening.  I’ve been and continue to be very impressed with Quanser and its vision and focus on wildly imaginative yet practical ways to enrich modern education.

  - Tom Lee
 

As Chief Education Officer at Quanser, Tom Lee is focused on spearheading the development of Quanser's global academic community. He is closely involved with Quanser's technology and solution development process and the company's partner and alliance programs. He holds a PhD in Mechanical Engineering, and an MASc and BASc in Systems Design Engineering from the University of Waterloo.

QUARC® Helps Researchers Bridge The Language Barrier and Grow

If you’re a MATLAB®/Simulink® user who is considering upgrading your research lab, it may be prudent to take some time to thoroughly review your short term and long term project goals. What is the state of your lab right now?  Are students engaged, motivated and excited about your lab? Where do you want it to be in the future?

Quanser’s experiments could definitely be part of a modular, incremental, budget-friendly solution.  But don’t overlook another valuable building block to accelerating your research and moving it forward: Quanser’s QUARC® control design software. QUARC works seamlessly with MATLAB/Simulink and offers you deep capabilities that are rarely fully exploited. 

Professor Aman Behal of the University of Central Florida's Electrical Engineering Department is a case in point. He took advantage of QUARC's Rapid Control Prototyping capability to save programmers months of development time because it bridges the gap between your simulations developed in MATLAB/Simulink and the real-time controller required to drive real hardware.

 Dr. Behal and his research assistant found that QUARC control software's ability to link

"incompatible" programming languages saved them many months of costly development time.

Because QUARC proved such a timesaver for Professor Behal, he began to consider how some of Quanser’s other building blocks – hardware such as the Rotary Servo systems – can be utilized in his other capacity as a teacher.

For more details on Professor Behal’s experience with Quanser and with QUARC, click here.