Computer Applications in Engineering Education最新文献

In today's environment, finite element analysis is crucial for Mechanical Engineers. In today's highly competitive industries, graduates need to be productive from Day one as they enter the industry. To meet the vast range of industrial requirements or even for higher education, education institutes must adhere to an industry enabled curriculum as defined in collaboration with industry employees. As students reach their prefinal year of mechanical engineering studies, they will encounter courses like finite element analysis, design of machine elements, and failure analysis in design, which will serve as foundation steps for their future careers. As students need to compete in the real world, it becomes imperative to have a thorough understanding of both theoretical and practical issues. The focus of current work is to provide them a platform to think as a real-time problem-solving engineer to address the society-based problems and how he/she approaches the problem in an optimized way and finally, convert the entire work to tangible documents in the form of research articles. Since 2018, a new vertical called as “advanced computer aided engineering (CAE)” has emerged to link and prepare people for the business. In the realm of finite element method (FEM) theoretical and allied laboratory work, the current study discusses sustainability while selecting the problem statement. The entire emphasis is on eco-environment with nature's sustainability along with the go-green concept in terms of materials, design, optimization, cost, quality, and so on. The present work includes several new features that were not present in the previous curriculum, such as transforming the work to high-quality journals, student feedback, subscription-based journal selection for the manuscript, and embedding experimental and analytical work alongside simulation studies. This time, 40 teams participated, with around 36 project works being qualified for publication in prestigious journals and 8–10 works being filed for Indian patents. In terms of quality and quantity of work completed, this is the best output attained in contrast to previous iterations. Because of the increasing growth rate of higher education, our students have been able to get into Top 100 QS ranked universities. The figures show that because of faculty involvement in the FEM lab, Advanced CAE I, and Advanced CAE II, over the previous 4–5 years, students were able to publish more than 50 publications in prestigious peer-reviewed International/National Journals and Conference papers.

The evolution of augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) technologies has ushered in a new era of immersive experiences, with applications ranging from entertainment to education. The proposed framework introduces a fog layer with an innovative, improved geographic load-balancing algorithm. It optimizes load distribution and provides quality of service (QoS) parameters that are important for enhancing user experiences for AR/VR applications. The iFogSim toolkit experimentally validates the framework in electroencephalogram-based VR/AR gaming applications. Also, the proposed framework is tested in a diverse range of scenarios. Results show that the proposed algorithm improves QoS for AR/VR applications with noticeable improvements on average latency, jitter, and packet loss. Future research should aim to address these limitations for a more comprehensive understanding of the proposed framework's practicality and effectiveness. The development of immersive technologies will continue to expand in multiple sectors, and future research will focus on energy efficiency, security, and real-world applications.

Building information modeling (BIM), as the core technology for digital transformation and development of the construction industry, is in vigorous development. This study analyzes the current situation of teaching BIM to construction management professionals in universities. Based on the CDIO (conceive–design–implement–operate) engineering education concept, a new teaching system of BIM technology for construction management professionals is proposed. It is composed of a diversified teaching mode of implanting BIM technology in professional courses, establishing a school–enterprise cooperation platform, expert linkage, BIM team construction, skill competition, and transformation of scientific research achievements, and provides a reference for the reform of practical teaching. It is proved that this education mode improves students' learning enthusiasm, engineering practice ability, solidarity and ability to solve practical engineering problems, cultivates outstanding talents in BIM technology, drives students' employment, and provides innovative talents in BIM technology needed for the development of the construction industry.

We present a new virtual laboratory developed with COMSOL multiphysics for the simulation of an acoustic levitator, as well as a three-dimensional (3D) printed experimental setup. Our software application simulates the acoustic pressure field and its interaction with a set of particles. Students can interact with the system having the possibility to change the frequency and distance parameters between transducers in real time. We have also developed and shared for free use the 3D printing design files for the construction of the necessary components for the acoustic levitator, as well as the instructions for its experimental implementation. The experimental results are contrasted, along with those from the virtual laboratory, providing students with useful tools to understand and interpret the acoustic phenomenon in question.

The traditional experimental teaching and practical teaching cannot meet the requirements of experimental practice teaching under the new situation, and virtual simulation technology has made great progress in teaching. Based on this, a new teaching mode—engineering simulation practices teaching platform—is proposed. In this regard, the methodology research is carried out, and the implementation scheme is proposed. The teaching design, implementation, and improvement have received good application results, which effectively improve the training level of applied talents for civil engineering majors in colleges and universities.

In the present paper several aspects of the simulation of complex chemical equilibrium are discussed, using two research and educational software: gPROMS® and GAMS®. All computations are performed to boost the understanding of chemical engineering students, undergraduate, and graduate, of the complex concepts behind both thermo-chemical processes and optimization techniques. Four case studies with varying levels of difficulty illustrate the proposed methodology and robustness of the modeling systems:

Our results indicate that the use of optimization tools offered bygPROMS® and GAMS®software are useful and efficient tools to calculate the chemical and phase equilibrium by minimizing the Gibbs energy, provided that adequate initial guesses are used. Furthermore, the computational time spent in the calculations was generally quite short. The obtained equilibrium compositions are benchmarked using the ubiquitous process simulators: ASPEN-Plus® and/or ASPEN-Hysys® as well as data available from the open literature. We obtained excellent agreement between our results and their counterpart obtained using ASPEN-Plus®. In the last part of this manuscript, authors share their experience in supervising senior term projects on the subject. A questionnaire was used to collect qualitative and quantitative feedback from the nine students involved in the projects. Their responses to a questionnaire focused on the chemical engineering thermodynamics theory as well as software usage during their investigations. This questionnaire demonstrates that students can overcome mathematical complexity by either using mathematical software or equivalent modeling systems (e.g., Matlab®, Mathematica^©, gPROMS®, and GAMS®).

As the cornerstone of spatial geometry and engineering drawings, three-view drawing lays the necessary foundation for students to learn geography, graphics, industrial design, geographic information science, and so forth. However, teaching three-view drawing can be challenging due to its abstraction. Currently, desktop and handheld augmented reality (AR) systems are widely applied to three-view teaching. However, existing systems suffer from visuo-tactile inconsistency and contain unfriendly interactions, resulting in a poor learning experience. In this paper, head-mounted AR is introduced for the first time in the teaching of three-view drawing. A system was designed for learning three-view drawing to facilitate students' free exploration and learning in lessons. Additionally, a comparative experiment was designed and conducted to investigate whether multimodal interaction and head-mounted AR help students to better understand the relationship between concrete three-dimensional (3D) objects and abstract two-dimensional planes and the impact on subjective perceptions. The results demonstrated that the proposed system significantly improved learning performance. Furthermore, the proposed system heightened students' interest in learning, made reproducing 3D structures more intuitive, and students were more willing to use such systems in their future studies.

Exam versioning is a widely used approach to prevent cheating during exams, but it can increase the workload for lecturers in terms of exam preparation and correction. Automated exam versioning can help reduce this workload and minimize errors in correction. This article presents the EVERSYS platform, which is focused on linear circuits but can be applied to other engineering fields. An exam problem is described as a circuit schema, a set of component values, and a set of questions to be answered. The EVERSYS platform allows lecturers to easily create exam versions with high variability, including different schemas, component values, and question sets. The platform is based on the MATLAB/Octave programming language and HTML document descriptions. Creating a multiversion exam is straightforward, involving the adaptation of a set of predefined MATLAB scripts and modification of the HTML format if necessary. A set of example exams is provided as well as the complete platform source code. The platform was tested during a 2021–2022 compulsory course on linear circuits at a Spanish University. The results indicated that the platform significantly reduced the time required for exam preparation and correction, and there was no statistically significant difference in student performance across different exam versions. Students reported high levels of satisfaction with the platform, and almost all agreed that it effectively prevents cheating during exams.

Available records of computer programming results from the universities in southeast Nigeria for the period under review (2016–2020) show that 70% of the students marginally passed the course. This, therefore, raises a concern to re-examine the instructional strategy used in the teaching and learning process, hence the adoption of innovative pedagogy that involved the use of digital tools like Google Classroom and Google Meet in their instructional delivery process of a computer programming course. This study adopted quasi-experimental research design involving intact classes with a nonequivalent group. Total population sampling technique was used to select all the 152 second-year computer education students made up of 60 males and 92 females drawn from the three private universities in Southeast Nigeria that offer computer programming. Data was collected using computer achievement test, digital skill development scale and engagement level scale. The findings of the study showed that students' academic achievement and level of engagement increased significantly in a computer programming course. Also, digital skills development and self-efficacy in the experimental group were higher than in the control group. Implementing innovative teaching strategies helped to facilitate the timely development of digital skills required by students to attain sufficient learner engagement in the learning process. It was recommended that computer educators should be encouraged to adopt innovative teaching techniques that blend with Classroom, Google Meet and MS Teams, among others to influence students' active engagement in the learning process.

Blended Learning (BL) is defined as a combination of face-to-face and digital activities that, in recent years, has been adopted more and more frequently by Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs). In the engineering field, the adoption of BL allows creating challenging situations for students with industry-like problems to foster the acquisition of advanced problem-solving skills. Thus, it can be used to enhance traditional learning by enriching it with new aspects, allowing to update the Intended Learning Outcomes traditionally defined by teachers. Although prior coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) teachers had the time to prepare and programme the transition to BL, during the pandemic they had to abruptly move to the full digital delivery of the content, requiring technological and organizational adaptation, as well as change in the content teaching and assessment methods. Through a systematic literature review, this paper aims to understand how BL has been implemented in the engineering field by HEIs, discussing if and how the learning expectations of teachers (evaluated through Bloom's Taxonomy) change when using different mixes of face-to-face and digital activities and when the target audience changes. More specifically, the investigation addresses how content and learning expectations are split and set in face-to-face and digital settings. Additionally, the interest is towards understanding how COVID-19 impacted the adoption of BL, not only during the pandemic but also after.