A novel multidisciplinary course: measurement and automated data acquisition

A novel multidisciplinary course was developed by the authors that integrates knowledge gained and tools acquired from the introductory freshman, circuits, mechanics and C/C++ courses and is built around the concepts associated with automated data acquisition systems. This lab intensive course uses a suite of data acquisition equipment located in a new Computer Aided Teaching Lab. The presentation format is two lectures and 1 three hour lab per week. The lectures are designed to cover material that directly supports the labs. Labs early in the course explore the subsystems of an automated data acquisition system. The students then learn the operation of the parallel port on the personal computer write C/C++ programs to control the parallel port, learn the operation of analog to digital and digital to analog converters, and learn the use of the C/C++ commands provided for controlling these subsystems. The students learn these concepts while doing typical experiments dealing with the measurement of temperature, strain, and the evaluation of a temperature controller.