Embedded System for Electronic Circuit Education

摘要

Embedded systems are ideal as electronic demonstrators because they provides the designer with wide possibilities for optimization through codesign. In many situations, like school visits at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Forskningstorget and Elektronikk- & Telekommunikasjonsdagen , it is desirable for the Department of Electronics and Telecommunication to both motivate and recruit new students to a future career in electronics. Thus, a demonstrator with an interesting presentation may give students an insight in what is possible when studying electronics at NTNU, in addition to a good examples of an electronic system. A good demonstrator for the department include one or more electronic topics and presents the relevant theory in different educational levelsThis master thesis includes the implementation of an embedded system used for demonstrating basic electronics. The Embedded System for Electronic Circuit Education is a platform for easy implementation of several scenarios with different topics within electronics. The system is designed with respect to a pedagogical view, and is implemented on both the Altera DE2 and the Atmel AVR STK600. In addition the embedded demonstrator includes a monitor for user interface and demonstration materiel. The main modules in the demonstrator is the Cyclone II 2C35 FPGA and the AVR AT90USB1287 microcontroller used to control the system behavior and the user interface. The demonstrator already includes two example scenarios, namely the Automatic Adjustment of Light and How to Count in Binary, Hexadecimal and Decimal with the topics Electronic Components and Numerical Systems respectively.With both existing and future scenarios, the embedded demonstrator has the possibility to both motivate and activate students with an interactive interface. In addition, the demonstrator may individualize educational levels to the different target groups with the demonstration material displayed on the monitor. Thus, the Embedded System for Electronic Circuit Education is a well suited demonstrator to recruit and motivate students to a future carrier in electronics.