Telepresence: An opportunity to develop real-world experimentation in education

A would-be autodidact can nowadays find educational material in the form of printed documents or digital supports, or it can access it via the Internet. In the field of automatic control, these media only carry virtual information, i.e., they do not provide real-world equipment. This drawback is the last obstacle to a possible "virtual campus". The aim of this paper is to present an approach for remote experimentation and to stress its educational and economic benefits. Remote PID control of an electrical drive illustrates the applicability of the approach.