Since September 1, 2012, RT-RK has been participating in a project sponsored by the Community Research and Development Information Service of the European Commission. The project, officially classified as FP7-ICT-2011.8.1 and coordinated from Novi Sad, gathers nine European academic institutions and research institutes. The main idea behind the project is development of a universal platform and knowledge management to cover a complete process of embedded systems learning throughout curriculums at European universities. A modular approach is considered for skills practice through supporting individualization in learning.
The platform under the acronym E2LP (Embedded Engineering Learning Platform) is challenging education of engineers in embedded systems design through real-time experiments that stimulate curiosity with the ultimate goal to support students to understand and construct their personal conceptual knowledge based on experiments. In addition to the technological approach, the use of cognitive theories on how people learn will help students to achieve a stronger and smarter adaptation of the subject. Applied methodology is evaluated from the scientific point of view in parallel with the implementation in order to feed back results to the R&D.
As a result, the proposed platform will ensure a sufficient number of educated future engineers in Europe, capable of designing complex systems and maintaining a leadership in the area of embedded systems, increasing European competitiveness in automotive, avionics, industrial automation, mobile communications, telecoms and medical systems.
The centerpiece of the E2LP platform designed and assembled by RT-RK, a baseboard with a low cost FPGA surrounded by a comprehensive collection of peripheral components that can be used to create a complex system, will cover most of laboratory tasks in embedded engineering courses. The first extension is a Marvell ARMADA 1500 board containing state-of-the-art DSP and a TV system for more complex multimedia experiments to be conducted. The other extension is a NXP LPC2364 board with a simpler CPU accompanied by typical sensors (thermometer, accelerometer, etc.) for basic programming exercises.
The university partners will integrate the E2LP system into their curriculum starting this fall.