Design & Manufacturing
About
This is a multi-disciplinary research area addressing societal and industrial needs through creative conceptualization, knowledge engineering, and the conversion of ideas into new or updated products, processes, or technologies via the most economic, efficient, and effective way possible. Our faculty members are very active in this field, focusing on design and development of systems, processes, machines, tools, and production equipment. Such research effort often requires consideration of economics, safety, informatics, as well as environmental, cognitive, cultural, sociological, and even physiological issues.
The following group of faculty members is keen to serve the community and industry partners across a range of sectors via novel industrial and academic research collaboration projects. The research program in the department covers, but is not limited to, the following key areas.
Design Theory and Methodology
Collaboration and interaction methodology; Design content and process management; Trans-disciplinary design Integration and optimization; DFX; Function modeling; User-centered design modeling.
Design and Manufacturing Informatics
Computer aided design (CAD); Computer aided manufacturing (CAM); Consumer product innovation; Engineering information integration; Industrial management informatics; Knowledge engineering; Robust design; Product lifecycle management; Intelligent planning.
Manufacturing and Production System Design and Automation
Additive manufacturing; Automation and robotics; Computer numerical control (CNC); Flexible manufacturing system (FMS); Hybrid manufacturing; STEP-NC, Laser welding of dissimilar materials; Physics, function, tool, and production model integration; and Manufacturing tooling design.
Manufacturing Process Optimization
Assembly/disassembly; Customization and development of Enterprise Resources Planning (ERP) systems; Extensions for manufacturing supply chains; Human-robot collaboration; Interoperability of industrial information interactions; Lean-manufacturing; Optimization of engineering design, manufacturing, and production processes; Manufacturing quality assurance; Simulation and analysis of manufacturing processes; Tolerance analysis and allocation.