Mechatronics and Robotics
(Applicants: You can only choose this Focus Area if you have also chosen a Discipline)

Mechatronics, a flexible, multi-technological approach in the integration of Mechanical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Electronics, and Information Sciences, is essential to the design of intelligent products. This integrative technology allows engineers to transform conceptions into reality. Within the next few decades, the trade of intelligent products with improved flexibility, performance, reliability, and maintainability will be crucial to the economic vitality of the United States.

Faculty and students in our program take part in laboratory research and teaching that pushes the frontier of technology in intelligent product design and development. Ten faculty members teach in this program.

Discoveries emerging from the ongoing research in the Robotics and Motion Control Laboratory continue to refine the design and control of intelligent robotic systems and automated machines. The laboratory houses several robots and precision positioning devices, as well as computational hardware for controlling and designing these devices.

The Computer Mechanics Laboratory's projects focus on the mechanical phenomena relevant to the computer industry. Research issues explored in this laboratory will lead to more reliable, smaller and faster computer peripheral devices.

The Real-Time Software and Control Laboratory has a national reputation for innovative research and instruction in the area of hardware and software control design for electromechanical systems.

In the Control and Identification Laboratory, students and faculty develop models appropriate for feedback control systems for these uncertain mechatronic systems. The design and fabrication of micro-electro-mechanical systems is another research area in Mechatronics whose activities are coordinated with the Berkeley Sensor and Actuator Center.

Faculty members involved in Robotics and Mechatronics are A. Agogino, D. Auslander, D. Bogy, R. Horowitz, H. Kazerooni, D. K. Lieu, L. Lin, A. Packard, A. Pisano, K. Poolla and M. Tomizuka.

Research Areas

• Robot design and control
  
• Manufacturing process control
  
• Human-machine systems
  
• Motion control
  
• Micro electromechanical systems (MEMS) machine design
  
• Computer software for real time control and diagnostics
  
• Mechanical systems modeling, identification, and control
  
• Computer mechanics

Research Facilities

• Various research and industrial electric and hydraulic robots
  
• Matsuura CNC machining center
  
• High-speed/High precision positioning tables
  
• DEC/SUN/NEXT Workstations and PC's
  
• Magnetic and disk file systems
  
• Various transducers for position, velocity, force and torque measurements
  
• Computer Mechanics Laboratory
  
• BSAC (Berkeley Sensor and Actuator Center) for MEMS research