A percepção de professores de química do ensino superior sobre experimentos didáticos controlados remotamente: um estudo a partir da construção de uma titulação ácido-base

This study investigated the perceptions of higher education chemistry teachers about the use of ICT in chemistry teaching and qualitatively analyzed their perceptions on the didactic use of a remotely controlled experiment. The selection criteria for the participants were teachers who had taught General Experimental Chemistry at some point in their career and who belonged to the chemistry course faculty at a Federal University in the south of Minas Gerais, Brazil. With no distinction being made regarding the respective training or area of expertise. The construction of the Remote Controlled Didactic Experiment (ECDR) on Acid-Base Titration and all stages of idealization, modeling, and programming were carried out in a Remote Laboratory. After validating the experiment prototype, semi-structured interviews were carried out with the aim of understand the role of experimentation in chemistry, how the interviewees use ICT in their classes, their understanding of remote experiments, and their perceptions of the EDCR built. The data analysis revealed resistance from these teachers to the use of ICT in experimental contexts and a lack of knowledge about what remote experiments are and how they can be used in the context of chemistry teaching. When presented with an experiment developed with didactic objectives, the teachers' perception changed, leading them to consider using ICT in their experimental practices as an auxiliary tool for the chemistry teaching process.O trabalho investigou as percepções de professores de química do Ensino Superior sobre o uso de TDIC no Ensino de Química, e analisou qualitativamente as percepções destes docentes sobre o uso didático de um experimento controlado remotamente. Os critérios de seleção dos participantes foram docentes que lecionaram Química Geral Experimental em algum momento de sua carreira e pertencentes ao quadro de docentes do curso de Química em uma Universidade Federal do sul de Minas Gerais, não sendo feita quaisquer distinções com relação à respectiva formação ou área de atuação destes docentes. A construção do Experimento Didático Controlado Remotamente (EDCR) sobre Titulação Ácido-Base e todas as etapas de idealização, modelagem e programação foram realizadas em um Laboratório Remoto. Após a validação do protótipo do experimento, foram realizadas entrevistas semi-estruturadas com o objetivo de compreender qual o papel da experimentação na química, como os entrevistados utilizam as TDIC em suas aulas, qual a compreensão sobre experimento remoto e quais as percepções sobre o EDCR construído. A análise dos dados revelou resistência por parte destes docentes com relação ao uso das TDIC em contextos experimentais, e um desconhecimento sobre o que são experimentos remotos e como eles podem ser utilizados no contexto da química. Ao serem apresentados com um experimento desenvolvido com objetivos didáticos, a percepção dos professores foi alterada, fazendo com que passassem a considerar a utilizarem a TDIC em suas práticas experimentais como uma ferramenta auxiliar para o processo de ensino da químic

Operating remote laboratories through a bootable device

Remote laboratories are laboratories where the hardware devices are accessible through the Internet 24 h a day for running experiments on physical processes. These laboratories are commonly used as complementary tools in engineering education, allowing students to integrate theoretical notions with practical experiments without the necessity of being physically present inside a laboratory. The increased availability of experiments in a remote laboratory is certainly an advantage for students, but it implies an increase of the probability of hardware and software failures. Thus, maintaining physical processes in a remote laboratory may become a heavy task for laboratory administrators. Remote laboratory inefficiency due to hardware and software maintenance can be certainly reduced if the time that is required for software reinstallation and/or upgrade is kept as short as possible. In this paper, a technique based on the use of a bootable (live) device on the server side of a remote laboratory is reported. This solution, which, in principle, can be used in almost any remote laboratory, allows an administrator to greatly reduce the time that is needed to fix a hardware/software failure, as well as to add a new process to the laboratory in a faster way. Moreover, the use of such a tool will also increase the reliability of the entire laboratory. The application of the proposed method to the "Automatic Control Telelab", which is a remote laboratory that was developed at the University of Siena, is also described in detail

Autonomous Marine Vehicles: Control-Oriented Modeling and Applications

This thesis will presents the state of the art and the personal contribution to the control-oriented modeling and control of marine vehicles. It is divided in two parts, the first one describes the scientific results related to the modeling and control aspects, while the second part describes an application related to the UAN project and a real-time distributed supervision system. The first result, described in chapter n.1, was motivated by the existence of a new class of hybrid underwater vehicles equipped with classic AUV and glider actuators. In particular, a dynamic model was derived for the general class of hybrid-propulsion vehicles, to which the case study eFolaga belongs. This development was made possible by considering a kinematic relaxation: the effects of the Centre of Gravity (COG) variations on the linear speed of the vehicle were neglected. The resulting simplified kinetic model, including the COG motion variation effects, takes a standard control-oriented form and consequently it can be easily used with all the available literature results regarding control and related aspects. This simplification works out if the COG speed is very small as compared to the vehicle speed, as it is the case of the eFolaga and of most vehicles with internal mass displacement systems. The second result, described in chapter n.2, was motivated by the need of a underwater vehicle capable to achieve high-energy efficiency by extracting propulsion directly from the sea-waves. The novel vehicle was designed to combine typical underwater capabilities such as underwater navigation and low-consumption gliding, with the clean-energy oriented feature of sea-wave energy extraction and propulsion conversion. The resulting vehicle, named Underwater Wave Glider (UWG) exploits the sea wave potential and the surface fluid profile with hydrodynamic wings to achieve a clean-energy passive propulsion. Currently the UWG is object of a combined study between ISME1 and CSSN2 . The importance of analyzing systems under constant sea-wave excitation motivated the study described in chapter n.3. In particular a method to combine surface models, described for instance with Motion Response Amplitude Operation (RAO), with classic underwater model was developed to evaluate system performances during floating motion. The resulting hybrid model, while capturing frequency domain specification of surface motion model, is able to provide time-varying access to the sea-wave induced effects acting on submerged vehicle parts. The chapter n.4, concluding the first part of the thesis, is dedicated to the control-allocation problem. In fact, the capability to reproduce coherently forces and moments through an intelligent use of actuators is a common requirement for marine vehicles control systems. The results presented, applied to a quite diffused class of marine vessels, can also be extended to other underwater or surface vehicle classes, by including the proper actuator spatial distribution and limitations. In particular, a parametric sequential quadratic programming method is proposed to solve the problem of control allocation with unconstrained forces/moments references. The new formulation, as shown in detail in the chapter, improves performances, with respect to the state-of-the-art, in case of not-feasibility or actuator saturation conditions. The second method, is used to properly distribute actuators configurations by exploiting a norm-infinity bounded reference set. This particular case has a direct impact on all vehicles of the considered class, equipped with human-interface-device (HID) systems. The implication of these new methods, together with the new drive-by-wire methodology, could affect considerably the nowadays vehicles maneuvering capabilities. The second part of the thesis is dedicated to the applications. In particular chapter n.5 will discuss experimental results of the UAN project final experiment in Throndheim, Norway (2011). Finally, chapter n.6 will present a cross-platform distributed system, named DCL, used to implement Hardware-In-the-Loop (HIL) and Software-In-the-Loop methodologies and to supervise real-time RTAI processes

Integration of several devices into a remote control laboratory using different platforms: Labview, Matlab and C/C++

[ES] Los laboratorios remotos de control posibilitan la realización de prácticas con equipos físicos reales que se encuentran ubicados en entornos remotos siendo accesibles por parte de los alumnos en cualquier instante de tiempo y desde cualquier lugar con conexión a Internet. En este artículo se presenta un conjunto de dispositivos físicos incorporados dentro de una esquema global de laboratorios remotos (AutomatL@bs) que posibilitan la realización de prácticas a distancia con estos dispositivos. Se prestará una especial atención a las diferentes posibilidades de comunicación entre la herramienta visual que dispone el usuario para su interconexión basada en Easy Java Simulations, y la conexión directa con los dispositivos físicos ubicados en los laboratorios remotos. Estos sistemas se han empleado para la realización de prácticas dentro del sistema AutomatL@bs desde el curso 1997/98.[EN] Remote control laboratories allow to work and made experiments with real physical devices that are located in remote environments. This equipment is accessible by students at any time and from anywhere with an Internet connection. In this paper a set of physical devices embedded within an overall scheme of remote laboratories (AutomatL@bs) is presented. By means of this remote laboratory the extudent can accomplish the experiments remotely. Special attention to the different possibilities of communication and interconnection between the interface and the physical device will be provided. The interface is made by means of Easy Java Simulations, so the direct connection between this and the physical devices located in remote laboratories will be analyzed.Este trabajo ha sido realizado parcialmente gracias a los proyectos CICYT DPI2007-62582 (Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología) e Incorporación de un laboratorio remoto en la red de laboratorios remotos y virtuales: Automat@Labs (UPC 2008).Costa-Castello, R.; Vallés Miquel, M.; Jiménez, LM.; Díaz-Guerra, L.; Valera Fernández, Á.; Puerto, R. (2010). Integración de dispositivos físicos en un laboratorio remoto de control mediante diferentes plataformas: Labview, Matlab y C/C++. Revista Iberoamericana de Automática e Informática industrial. 7(1):23-34. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1697-7912(10)70005-4OJS233471AutomatL@bs (2008). Red de laboratorios de automatica, http://lab.dia.uned.es/automatlab/.Badersten, L. and A. Avasjö (1997). Ericsson company sweden and lund university. In: 13 EUCEN European Conference.Birk, A., & Kenn, H. 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