Undergraduate Courses 2016-17

This general-education course introduces the basics of electronic and information technology and their applications to daily-life consumer electronics and communication devices. Contents include the representation of signals in the time and frequency domains; digitization of information; coding for data compression and error protection; transmission of signals; cellular mobile phones and wireless communications; and the Internet. It is expected that through studying these technologies and how they address the problems encountered in the information technology area, students will also grasp the skills in solving problems with engineering approach and spirit and appreciate how these technologies impact the society

The course focuses on both the high level design concepts for creative multimedia marketing, as well as equipping the students with the necessary tools to manipulate digital media. The course covers theories such as strategy formulation, company branding, human perceptions, as well as fundamental implementation skills such as audio data processing, special image effects, and video handling techniques.

The course introduces the fundamental knowledge on the design, implementation and evaluation of a robot and its sub-systems. It covers the basic principles of analog and digital circuits as well as robot sensing and control mechanisms. Students have to apply the knowledge and principles learned to design and build a functional robot by the end of the course. Students who have completed ELEC 2200, ELEC 2400, ELEC 2410, or ELEC 2420, must obtain instructor's approval to take this course.

Have you ever wondered what technologies go into your mobile phone or a WiFi hotspot? Through hands on work with a simple but fully functional wireless communication system, you will understand the basic engineering tools used and tradeoffs encountered in the design of these systems. This course is centered on weekly laboratories, each designed to introduce an important concept in the design of these systems. The lab sessions are supported by two one-hour lectures and a tutorial that introduce the concepts for the next laboratory, as well as reviewing and expanding the concepts learned in the previous laboratory.

A practical training course in an industrial simulated environment. For students of the Computer Engineering program only. Graded P or F.

For Electronic Engineering (Information and Communication Engineering) students only. A practical training course for a total duration of four weeks. Topics include basic electronic practices, Linux system administration, Linux network administration, software engineering practice, and safety. Graded P or F.

A practical training course in an industrial simulated environment. For Electronic Engineering students only. Graded P or F.

Full-time internship training for a period of at least six weeks in an organization or company recognized by the Department for providing qualified internship training relevant to the electronic and computer engineering profession. Students must also complete the USTSEEB Safety Training module. Cantonese or other working languages may be used in off-campus trainings and internships, in some situations. For students in the BEng in Electronic Engineering program under the four-year degree only. Internship coordinator's approval is required for enrollment in the course. Graded P, PP or F.

This is an introductory course for signal and system analysis. The course covers signal analysis tools including continuous- and discrete-time Fourier series and Fourier transform, and Laplace Transform; interactions between signals and linear time invariant (LTI) systems, and differential and difference equations as LTI systems, sampling theorem; and application examples in communication and control systems. MATLAB introduced as an integral part of this course.

This is an accelerated and intensive course on signals and system analysis. The course covers continuous- and discrete-time Fourier series, Fourier transform, Laplace Transform, interactions between signals, linear time invariant systems, differential and difference equations, and the sampling theorem. There will also be an introduction to advanced concepts and related applications, such as various transforms used in image processing and modulation techniques used in communication systems, which will allow students to develop a deeper understanding of the fundamentals of signals and systems. MATLAB will be introduced as an integral part of this course.

Design of combinatorial and sequential logic circuits; introduction to logic families (TTL and CMOS); programmable logic devices; special digital systems. Laboratory assignments make extensive use of computer-aided design (CAD) tools for design, simulation and testing.

This is an introductory course to computer organization. The topics covered include instruction-set-design, digital design and computer arithmetic, controller and datapath design, memory systems, input-output systems, interrupts, pipelining, performance analysis, assembly language programming, and survey of advanced architectures.

Fundamental electronic concepts for DC and AC circuits, KVL and KCL, Thevenin and Norton Theroems, linearity and superposition, nodal and mesh analyses, sinusoidal steady state and phasor, transient analysis, transfer functions and Bode plots, op-amps, diodes, MOS transistors and related circuits.

Basic electronic concepts and components; DC, AC and transient analyses of analog electronic circuits; operational amplifiers and circuits; digital electronics includes binary number systems, Boolean algebra, and combinational and sequential logic. For non-ECE students only.

This is an introductory course for electric power systems and smart grid. The course includes the following topics: power concepts for ac systems, generation, transmission, distribution, and utilization of electric power, system aspects of synchronous machines, transmission lines, transformers, and motors. Power flow and contingency states. Smart grid concepts, role of information technology in smart grid applications, smart metering, smart buildings and homes.

An introduction to statistical inference and random processes in electrical engineering, including the necessary probabilistic background. Random variables, distribution and density functions, characteristic functions, conditional statistics, expectation, moments, stochastic processes.

This course is an accelerated and intensive course on probability and random processes. There will be an introduction to statistical inference and random processes in electrical engineering, including the necessary probabilistic background. The course also covers random variables, distribution and density functions, characteristic functions, conditional statistics, expectation, moments, stochastic processes.

A compulsory, one year course for Electronic Engineering and EE (Information and Communication Engineering) students only. This course is designed to provide academic advising to students and/or to develop students' communication skills in interacting with the technical and non-technical audiences in their professional careers. Graded P or F.

The course provides a comprehensive overview of signal processing and communications using quantitative modeling and analysis. Topics include: 7 layer communications model, discrete Fourier transform and z-transform, IIR and FIR filter design techniques and realizations, complexity and implementation considerations of FFT and FIR/IIR, source coding, digital modulation, PSD and spectrum, effects of noise to communication system designs, detection theory, matched filter, signal space and error analysis, channel models and channel coding. Application examples are provided to illustrate on how practical communication systems are designed using these quantitative tools. Design projects are set up so that the students can apply theory learnt in the class to physical problems. MATLAB CAD tools are being used as an integral part of this course.

This course introduces basic concepts, tools and techniques for modeling, analysis, and control of dynamical systems. The course starts from the use of differential equations to model continuous time systems. Examples from a variety of Electronic and Computer Engineering disciplines will be given to illustrate the modeling process. Then, basic tools needed for analyzing the behavior of dynamical systems will be presented. Finally, techniques for controlling their behavior will be introduced. Throughout the course, laboratory experiments demonstrating the use of these analysis/design tools will be included.

This course is designed to teach techniques on how to integrate machine-level software and hardware in ARM-core microcontroller based systems. It makes use of industry-standard techniques and technologies, from which students can interface, design and program microcontroller systems. The task of the course will be to complete five laboratory experiments which address different aspects of hardware/software interfacing, and one large microprocessor/microcontroller based project which should result in the design and implementation of a small working embedded system.

This course presents an overview, applications, fundamentals and design flow of the state-of-the-art integrated circuits (IC) and systems. Course contents include fabrication process; diodes, bipolar transistors and MOS transistors and modes of operations; and fundamental of analog, digital and mixed-signal IC design.

This is an introductory course for semiconductor device operation principles and technology in common electronic products such as integrated circuit (IC), camcorder, solar cell, memory elements, smartcard, etc. Topics covered include Semiconductor properties, IC fabrication technology, PN junctions, Bipolar Junction Transistors (BJT), MOSFETs, CCD and the future technology trend in the electronic industry.

This area course introduces applied electromagnetics from fundamentals to applications. Topics include: Gauss', Faraday's and Ampere's laws; electrostatics and magnetostatics; Maxwell's equations; electromagnetic plane wave propagation; transmission lines; radiation and antenna fundamentals; light wave fundamentals. Students will also acquire hands-on experience to electromagnetics through laboratory sessions.

The course is intended to address different needs of engineers in operating and managing engineering business. Different topics will be covered in different semesters by experienced faculty members who have extensive working experience. Through the class, the students can acquire a sense on how to bridge their engineering training with the operation in the commercial world from the Engineering perspective. Students must obtain prior consent form the course instructor for enrollment.

Continuation of ELEC 2910. Graded P or F.

Continuation of ELEC 2920. Graded P or F.

Selected topics in Electronic and Computer Engineering. May be repeated for credit, if different topics taken.

Representation of signals, optimum detection of signals in noise, matched filtering, error probability calculations for digital modulation. Multilevel modulation schemes, comparison of digital communications systems, mobile and wireless channels, diversity techniques, spread-spectrum communications, Resource Partitioning in Multiuser systems (FDMA, TDMA, CDMA) and their applications in cellular mobile and wireless personal communications.

Overview of computer networks: network architecture and switching techniques. Introduction to the Internet, network programming, and layer architecture. Application layer: HTTP, FTP, SMTP, and CDN. Transport layer: TCP and UDP. Network layer: IP routing, NAT, and DHCP. Data link layer and local area networks: MAC protocols, Ethernet, and hubs/bridges/switches.

This course introduces methods to process images on a computer. Topics include the formation and quantification of digital images, morphological image processing, image enhancement in the spatial and frequency domain, image restoration, color image processing, image compression, image segmentation, image representation and description. This course is mathematics-oriented. It requires basic knowledge of linear algebra, calculus and linear filtering. Familiarity with the programming language MATLAB is needed.

This course begins with an overview of some fundamental information theory related to data compression. Lossless techniques, including Huffman/arithmetic coding, LZ coding, and their applications; and lossy techniques, including quantization (both scalar and vector), transform coding, predictive coding and their applications will be discussed. Several international standards (such as GIF, and JPEG for image coding, and LPC vocoder and its variants) will be discussed. Programming exercises on various image and speech codes will be an integral part of this course.

Communication and information theory; self and mutual information measures; channel models and capacity; source coding; hamming codes; cyclic codes; BCH and Reed-Solomon codes; convolutional codes and the Viterbi algorithm; burst error correction; Turbo coding.

This is a UG final year introductory course to digital speech processing. The focus will be on speech recognition techniques. Topics to be covered include general paradigm for speech recognition, approaches to speech recognition, signal processing and analysis methods for speech recognition, pattern recognition techniques, speech recognition system design and implementation issues, hidden Markov Model, connected word and continuous speech recognition issues including training and language modeling.

This course provides students with a background in digital media, multimedia applications development, and multimedia systems. Topics include digital media fundamentals, authoring, and multimedia systems design issues. Weekly laboratory and programming assignments introduce students to media editing tools and programming issues. A final project challenges students to apply what they learn.

This course introduces basic building blocks of robots: actuators (DC and servo motors), sensors (proprioceptive/exteroceptive, passive/active); controller platforms as well as mechanical modules; and basic concepts of robotics: rigid motion and configuration space, kinematics, dynamics, trajectory generation and planning, locomotion, localization and mapping, navigation and control. Using these basic building blocks and robotic concepts, students will learn how to design and build a robot prototype that meets certain design specifications. Design examples include a mobile robot to engage in a competition, a robotic manipulator in a typical assembly task, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) in a surveillance application, etc.

In this course, students will learn the important concepts and modern design practices of embedded computing systems. They will see how a complex embedded system can be systematically developed as a union of software and hardware. The course will cover several fundamental topics, such as design targets, hardware/software co-design methodology, common design techniques, processors, architectures, and physical implementations. It will also cover several advanced topics, such as behavioral modeling, low-power techniques, and systems-on-chip.

This course introduces the basic theory and design skills for FPGA-based design. The course aims to equip the students with enough knowledge and skills for the real world engineering using FPGA devices. Major topics include introduction to reconfigurable computing, hardware description language, FPGA device, and mapping flow. Students will gain hands-on experiences of the complete FPGA-based design cycle, from design specification, synthesis, implementation and simulation in this course.

This course introduces the hardware platform, the OS and software development platforms, and applications of Android-based smartphones and tablets. It will cover: hardware platforms of smartphones/tablets and their key components, such as mobile processors, communications chips, display, touchscreen, graphics, camera, battery, GPS, and various sensors; tutorials of Android and applications development on Android; latest applications, such as augmented reality, location based service, mobile TV, mobile health, mobile social network, handheld games, mobile computer vision, etc; low power hardware and software design techniques.

CMOS process and design rules; MOS device electronics; CMOS circuit and logic circuit characterization and performance estimation; VLSI design and verification tools. Laboratory work will be centered on industry standard tools.

Multiple-stage operational amplifiers, frequency response, feedback analysis, stability and compensation, Slew rate, advanced amplifier design techniques, analog VLSI building blocks.

Power computation, diodes and rectifier circuits, power factor correctors, switch mode power converters, magnetic components, switch capacitor power converters, linear regulators, and integrated circuit techniques for controller design.

This is an introductory course for semiconductor materials and devices. The course content includes the following topics: the growth and properties of semiconductor crystals; the theory of the electronic structures of atoms and solids; the energy band and conduction mechanisms in semiconductors; the physics of junction diodes; excess carriers; bipolar junction transistors (BJT); metal oxide semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFET).

For UG students only. The course is intended to provide students with fundamental knowledge in device and integrated circuits (IC's) fabrication. The class covers the modules of device fabrication (including clean room concept, cleaning procedures, diffusion, lithography, wet processing, dry etching, chemical vapor deposition, sputtering) and process integration to form IC's. The lab section will bring the students with hands-on experience in IC fabrication facilities in Nanoelectronics Fabrication Facility of HKUST.

Introduction of solar and other renewable energy generation. Silicon and other semiconductor solar cells. Physics and circuit modeling. Energy storage and distribution.

An introductory course in optics covering fundamentals of geometrical and physical optics. Topics include: review of geometrical optics, first order optical system and analysis, aberration, aperture and field stops; Basic wave theory, diffraction, interference, polarization, dispersion; fundamentals of optical instrumentation.

To introduce optoelectronics and fiber optics for communications. Topics include optical fibers, optical sources, optical detectors, and passive components for wavelength-division multiplexing. Laboratory gives hands-on experience in handling optical fibers, lasers and detectors, micro-optical components, opto-mechanical equipment, and building wavelength-division-multiplexed optical links.

Techniques of radio-frequency/microwave circuit technology. S-parameter design of passive components; computer-aided analysis and design of microwave circuits. Component structures such as microstrip lines, waveguides, power divider and directional combiner, resonators and filters.

This course builds on the fundamental knowledge of biosensors and bioinstrumentation. Lectures and hands-on laboratory experiments cover: (1) Basic concepts of biomedical signal analysis; (2) Measurements of bioelectrical, biomechanical and biochemical signals for medical diagnosis and clinical monitoring; (3) Principles of biosensors and biochips; (4) Simple design of new bioinstrumentation and biosensor to solve biomedical problems.

This course introduces medical imaging methods to senior undergraduate and graduate students. It covers the following topics: radiation, radiography, computer tomography, radioisotope imaging, diagnostic ultrasound imaging, magnetic resonance imaging, and applications of different imaging modalities. This course requires basic knowledge of linear algebra, calculus, and geometry. Familiarity with a programming language such as MATLAB is needed.

Each undergraduate student enrolled in Electronic Engineering and Computer Engineering is required to complete a final year project before graduation. The student is expected to submit a project progress report by the end of the first term of the project, complete a final project report, and give both oral and poster project presentations at the end. The project is conducted under the supervision of a faculty member. For students in the BEng in Computer Engineering and BEng in Electronic Engineering programs under the four-year degree only.

Each undergraduate student taking the Research Option of the Electronic Engineering or Computer Engineering program is required to complete an individual thesis and the thesis should summarize his/her work conducted under the supervision of a faculty member. The student is expected to submit a progress report by the end of the first term of the project, complete a final report, and give both oral and poster project presentations at the end. For students in the BEng in Computer Engineering and BEng in Electronic Engineering programs under the four-year degree only.

Each Computer Engineering student is required to complete a final year project before graduation. The project is conducted under the supervision of faculty members from the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and/or the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering. The credit load will be spread over 3 terms.

Only for honors students of the BEng Computer Engineering Program. They are expected to conduct research/independent work under the supervision of faculty members from the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and/or the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering, summarize their work in an individual thesis and make a presentation at the end of the sequence. The credit load will be spread over 3 terms.

Each undergraduate student enrolled in the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering is required to complete a final year project before graduation. The student is expected to submit a project progress report by the end of the first term of the project, and to complete a final project report and to give an oral project presentation at the end. The project is conducted under the supervision of a faculty member. The credit load will be spread over 3 terms.

Each undergraduate student taking the Honors Research Option of the Electronic Engineering program is required to complete a final year thesis before graduation. The student is expected to complete an individual thesis and the thesis should summarize his/her work conducted under the supervision of a faculty member. The credit load will be spread over 3 terms.

Each undergraduate student taking the Entrepreneurship Option of the Electronic Engineering program is required to complete a final year project before graduation. The project will have significant focus on starting new companies, improving manufacturing process, project management, meeting requirements of existing standards, and marketing strategy. It will be led by faculty members with startup and management experiences to provide first hand training to these students. The credit load will be spread over 3 terms.

Each student of the Computer Engineering program is required to complete a final year project before graduation. The student is expected to conduct a project on a topic related to Computer Engineering and/or its application. The project is guided and conducted under the supervision of faculty members from the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and/or the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course. For CPEG students under the four-year degree only. May be graded PP.

Each student taking the Research Option of the Computer Engineering program is required to complete an individual thesis before graduation. The student is expected to conduct a research on a topic related to Computer Engineering and/or its application. The thesis is conducted under the supervision of faculty members from the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and/or the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course. For CPEG students under the four-year degree only. May be graded PP.

Continuation of ELEC 3930 (prior to 2015-16). This is a compulsory, one year course for Computer Engineering students under the three-year degree only. Graded P or F.

Selected topics in electronic and computer engineering studied under the supervision of a faculty member. Enrollment subject to approval by the department.

Each undergraduate student enrolled in the Honors Research Option of the BEng program in Electronic Engineering is required to have R&D work experience in a company or research lab. The job and the nature of work has to be approved by the department for fulfilling this course requirement. Graded P or F.