Course Restructuring and Laboratory Development in Power Electronics and Electric Drives

德州农工大学金斯维尔分校（TAMUK）的电气工程专业将电力电子作为选修课，电气机械作为必修课。由于越来越多的人认为这些课程是过时的，所涵盖的材料也过时了，因此电气机械课程的学时已经减少，而且从近年来的情况来看，选修这些课程的学生人数明显减少。然而，电力行业对训练有素的电力工程师的需求持续增长！因此，该项目的目标是通过引入使用数字控制和数字信号处理（DSP）的艺术开始实验室来振兴这些课程。这种重组的目标包括：1)通过将电力电子和电力驱动与数字和基于DSP的控制相结合，以这种方式提供有关电力电子和电力驱动的必要信息；2)使改造后的课程具有吸引力和刺激性；3)确保最高的教育质量；4)让学生为工业和高级课程做好准备。作为这些课程修订的结果，培养了更多训练有素的电力工程师，以满足现代电力工业的需求。课程重组和实验室开发是基于明尼苏达大学（UMN）开发的材料和方法。通过在电力电子和电力驱动课程中注册的本科生数量的显著增加以及他们在这些课程中的表现，这些材料和方法已经被证明是成功的。该项目主要针对南德克萨斯地区的少数民族本科生，但该地区化学过程工业和电气公司的专业工程师也可以从这些课程中受益。

The electrical engineering program at Texas A&M University- Kingsville (TAMUK) offers power electronics as an elective course and electric machinery as a required course. Due to increased perception that these courses are old-fashion and the materials covered in them are out-of-date, the credit hours of electric machinery courses have been reduced, and there is evident from recent years that shows a reduction in the number of students enrolling in these courses. However, the power industry demand for trained power engineers continues to grow! Hence, the objective of this project is to revitalize these courses with the introduction of start-of-art laboratories using digital control and digital signal processing (DSP). The goals of this restructuring include 1) to provide the requisite information about power electronics and electric drives in such a way by combining them with digital and DSP based control; 2) to make the reconstructed courses appealing and exciting; 3) to ensure the highest quality of education; and 4) to prepare students for industry as well as for advanced courses. As a consequence of these course revisions, a larger supply of trained power engineers is produced to meet modern power industry needs. The course restructuring and laboratory development are based on the materials and approaches developed at the University of Minnesota (UMN). The materials and approaches have been demonstrated to be successful at UMN through the significantly increased number of undergraduate students enrolled in the Power Electronic and Electric Drives courses and in their performance in these courses. This project is mainly targeting minority undergraduate students in South Texas area but working professional engineers in the chemical process industries and in the electric companies in this area can also benefit from taking these courses.