A smart aquarium, a heated cocktail table, a self-illuminating walkway and a transport robot are among the 14 prototypes that 50 students from the School of Engineering at the University of Minho (EEUM) presented to the public on 5 February at the Azurém campus in Guimarães.
The technologies were developed as part of the Integrative Project module within the Industrial Electronics and Computer Engineering degree programme at UMinho. The exhibition and live demonstration of the innovations took place from 10.00 am to 4.00 pm in the central hall of the Azurém campus. Admission was free, and the event was attended by six secondary school classes from other municipalities across the country.
Also on display were a reaction-testing device, a robotic arm, an induction charging track, a mini-dam, a car that follows a light or a line, as well as integrated audio amplifiers and an equaliser, an H-bridge-activated DC motor and an automatic motor-generator switch.

With the market in mind

The projects were developed this semester as part of the Integrative Project module, in groups of three to five students, putting their creativity, innovative capacity and learning skills to the test.
The students had to ensure that each technology offered useful and competitive functions, affordable production costs, safe operation, high reliability, appropriate certification and comprehensive documentation.
Posters, videos demonstrating the prototypes in action and supporting materials for these projects will also be on display in the central hall of the campus; throughout the day, these were assessed by 11 lecturers from the Department of Industrial Electronic Engineering.
The School of Engineering congratulates all the students on their projects and on the professionalism with which they presented them to everyone present at this exhibition, which made the headlines in the region’s newspapers.