Wireless Sensor Networks: An Interdisciplinary Topic For Freshman Design

Wireless sensor networks (WSN) are a nascent technology that builds upon the recent decade’s advances in electrical and mechanical engineering including wireless communications, low-power embedded systems, MEMS-sensor design, network architectures and instrumentation applications. These networks promise a means by which to better monitor and understand our industrial, military and natural environments. Wireless sensors have broad interdisciplinary interest and have been recognized as one of the significant emerging technologies by the National Science Foundation 2 and the general press 3 . Using wireless sensor networks as a motivating technology, this paper discusses a new course for electrical and computer engineering (ECE) and mechanical engineering (ME) freshman at the University of Vermont (UVM). The course provides students with a hands-on experience in which interdisciplinary team work, technical communications and hardware design is emphasized. The engineering program at UVM is relatively small with three departments (electrical and computer, civil and environmental and mechanical engineering) and with ~100 freshman entering each year. Thus the methodology presented herein may serve as a model for similarly sized programs.