At the University of Queensland, mechatronic engineering is introduced to first year students through a project-based subject in which students design and build a robot to play Robo-Cricket. The aim of the subject is to introduce students to engineering design and, most importantly, to the range of personal and interpersonal skills required to complete mechatronic engineering projects. The impl...

This paper intends to provide the reader with an overview of the Special Issue on Wave Energy Converters. Through 16 contributions from authors of 10 different countries, a number of key topics have been tackled, including resource assessment, engineering design, and financial analysis. As a whole, the Special Issue forms an interesting and helpful compendium on the state of the art of wave ene...

Application Background Patients who are interested in facial rejuvenation are increasingly well informed, expecting visible and significant results after undergoing an aesthetic procedure. However, many energy based devices cannot guarantee clinical efficacy due to shortfalls in their engineering design and inherent lack of reproducibility. This paper aims to describe the underlying reasons beh...

Identifying binary sequences {} whose autocorrelations {} are jointly as small as possible, for fixed , is important for engineering design purposes. The “best” sequences are those with the largest merit factor  . As an example, the sequence 1−1 1−1 1 1−1−1 1 1 1 1 1 has the largest  value 16912 = 140833 among all such with  = 12. As another example, the sequence 1−1 ...

This in-progress report describes initial findings regarding an experiment to test the effectiveness of curriculum modules that engage students in engineering design practices in the context of high school biology and chemistry courses. Based on pilot studies, the instructional materials have been revised to increase the visibility of engineering design concepts, strengthen the connection betwe...

The product form has an important role in the judgment of a product, and increasingly more products within a market segment have similar technology and performance. This has elevated the importance of the appearance of a product, and being the first impression of a product visual, this work presents methods for the integration of the product form preference into the engineering design process. ...