Mechatronics

Mechatronics refers to a flexible, multi-technological approach in the integration of Mechanical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Electronics, and Information Sciences. Mechatronics is essential in the design of intelligent products; it allows engineers to transform their conceptions into reality. Within the next decades, the trade of intelligent products with improved flexibility, performance, reliability and maintainability will be crucial for the economic vitality of the United States. The Mechatronics Program of the Department of Mechanical Engineering involves research and teaching activities that push the frontier of technology in intelligent product design and development. Nine faculty members are involved with this program, and their research projects are carried out at various laboratories.
The research activities in the Robotics and Motion Control Laboratory involve 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 research activities in the Computer Mechanics Laboratory are devoted to the study of the mechanical phenomena which is relevant to the computer industry. They include the dynamic analysis of computer peripheral devices such as disk files, the tribological analysis of the disk head interface in magnetic storage devices and the design of servo systems and micro actuators for disk file systems. The 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. Research in the Control and Identification Laboratory focusses on developing models appropriate for feedback control from input-output data and designing high-performance control systems for these uncertain mechatronic systems.

Professor Kazerooni's Extender amplifies human strength in lifting heavy objects.

Research Areas

Robot design and control
Manufacturing process control
Human-machine systems
Motion control
Machine design
Computer software for real time control and diagnositics
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

Faculty

A. Agogino, D. Auslander, D. Bogy, R. Horowitz, H. Kazerooni, D. K. Lieu, A. Packard, K. Poolla, M. Tomizuka

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