Mechatronics engineer: The one who does 'everything'

"THINK of a mechatronics engineer as a Swiss Army knife. They can do a lot of things," chuckled Associate Professor Dr Yeap Gik Hong (叶钰烽), UOW Malaysia KDU's Head of Operations (Batu Kawan Campus) and Head of the School of Engineering, Computing and Built Environment.

To illustrate it, Assoc Prof Yeap uses an innovation that optimises both velocity and safety.

"The lower your centre of gravity, the more stable you are. So, when you are in motion on the ground, your safety lies in how close you are to the ground.

"In a car, this means that the lower your car is, the more stable and safer you will be while travelling," he said.

This, as with many things in the world, is easier said than done.

First off, no highway can be as flat and levelled as an airport runway or a Formula One racetrack. There are also multitudes of bumps and potholes along the way.

But what if the car can lower or raise itself as needed while travelling? And what if the car can do this while travelling at speeds never before possible?

If this can be done, then humanity's land travels will be faster than ever without compromising on safety, increasing efficiency and productivity while saving time.

Enter the mechatronics engineer.

Assoc Prof Yeap said by combining sensors and cameras, mechanics, control and automation systems, electronic and computer technology, teams of engineers have already succeeded in building cars that lower and raise themselves while travelling at speeds no human can react to in time.

While the innovation is astronomically expensive, he said enhancements were being devised every year now to make the production more cost-effective, and he expects automatically adjusting suspension to be the standard feature of all cars someday.

That, he concluded, is what mechatronics engineering is all about: combining technologies.

"Even a refrigerator that knows when you are running low on milk and orders it for you is an example of a smarter system," he said, explaining that such a gadget involves the integration of sensors and camera, artificial intelligence & machine learning, communications and internet technologies, which only a mechatronics engineer can grapple with all at once.

The path to walking out of UOW Malaysia KDU with enough knowledge to be a mechatronics engineer takes four years.

It can be a little dry in the first year but there are no two ways about it because it is necessary to internalise the theory of electrical & electronic circuits, engineering mathematics, computer-aided design, analogue electronics and a lot more.

Once you get past this gauntlet, the second year's knowledge that you need to absorb becomes more exciting, beginning with digital electronics, micro-controllers, thermodynamics and more.

The third year is even more advanced, and you will find yourself faced with robotics, artificial intelligence, computer, and machine vision, and much more.

The fourth year is a real challenge because it involves industrial training in hi-tech companies for at least three months, and there is the final year project in which you must prove you can invent something.

UOW Malaysia KDU also offers a few elective subjects for you to throw in, allowing you to delve deeper into specific elements of mechatronics, such as robotics or sensor technology.

"If you are a school-leaver and did well in mathematics and physics, consider mechatronics; it is a world where you invent something almost every day," said Assoc Prof Yeap.

The degree pathway via UOW Malaysia KDU comes with automatic acceptance into University of Wollongong, a public Australian university an hour's drive from Sydney.

This path enables mechatronics students to immerse themselves deeply into technology on a global scale and synergise with an international body of students.

To understand the depths of UOW Malaysia KDU's Bachelor of Mechatronics Engineering with Honours, visit www.uowmkdu.edu.my.

This content is provided by UOW Malaysia KDU Penang University College Sdn Bhd.

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