Project

# Title Team Members TA Documents Sponsor
7 Garden Guardian
 Aleah Gacek
Claire McGrath
Nick Hartmann
 Jason Zhang design_document1.pdf
design_document2.pdf
final_paper1.pdf
presentation1.pdf
proposal2.pdf
proposal1.pdf
video
Problem:

Gardens are an easy and fun hobby that a lot of people have in their backyard. One issue when it comes to gardens is being able to protect them. Gardens grow many different fruits and vegetables that are prone to getting attacked or eaten by different animals. Having a hindrance would improve the garden's quality and protect your plants.

Solution Overview:

Our solution for deterring animals away from one’s garden is a portable battery-powered (most likely solar) device that can be mounted above one’s garden. It uses a passive infrared sensor that notices movement in the garden area.

Solution Components:

Sensor System:

Passive infrared system for detecting movement in the area which triggers a high signal to the 5-volt relay (connect to 120V compatible noise/light deterrent)

Power System:

Solar panels -> battery storage -> PCB -> 5-volt relay (5-volt to 120 AC conversion) -> light/noise deterrent

Processing System:

PCB sends signal to light/noise deterrent and can determine night=light deterrent and day=noise deterrent; compatible/controlled with Arduino

Criterion for Success:

Our device can pick up on animal movement in the area around the garden and turn on the light/noise deterrent to scare the animal away and protect the garden while running on solar power.

Alternatives:

An easy deterrent against large animals is putting a wired fence around your garden. This doesn’t work against birds or smaller animals. This also is quite annoying for the garden owner to have to move the fence each time they want to work on the garden.

Another alternative is using an ultrasonic animal repeller. This device emits a certain frequency that deters animals away while also not at a frequency that humans can hear. A problem with this is that there is not a ‘general frequency’ that deters all animals away. You can only set it to one frequency that deters certain animals. We think our device would be better because it would deter all animals.



Interactive Proximity Donor Wall Illumination

Sungmin Jang, Anita Jung, Zheng Liu

Interactive Proximity Donor Wall Illumination

Featured Project

Team Members:

Anita Jung (anitaj2)

Sungmin Jang (sjang27)

Zheng Liu (zliu93)

Link to the idea: https://courses.engr.illinois.edu/ece445/pace/view-topic.asp?id=27710

Problem:

The Donor Wall on the southwest side of first floor in ECEB is to celebrate and appreciate everyone who helped and donated for ECEB.

However, because of poor lighting and color contrast between the copper and the wall behind, donor names are not noticed as much as they should, especially after sunset.

Solution Overview:

Here is the image of the Donor Wall:

http://buildingcampaign.ece.illinois.edu/files/2014/10/touched-up-Donor-wall-by-kurt-bielema.jpg

We are going to design and implement a dynamic and interactive illuminating system for the Donor Wall by installing LEDs on the background. LEDs can be placed behind the names to softly illuminate each name. LEDs can also fill in the transparent gaps in the “circuit board” to allow for interaction and dynamic animation.

And our project’s system would contain 2 basic modes:

Default mode: When there is nobody near the Donor Wall, the names are softly illuminated from the back of each name block.

Moving mode: When sensors detect any stimulation such as a person walking nearby, the LEDs are controlled to animate “current” or “pulses” flowing through the “circuit board” into name boards.

Depending on the progress of our project, we have some additional modes:

Pressing mode: When someone is physically pressing on a name block, detected by pressure sensors, the LEDs are controlled to

animate scattering of outgoing light, just as if a wave or light is emitted from that name block.

Solution Components:

Sensor Subsystem:

IR sensors (PIR modules or IR LEDs with phototransistor) or ultrasonic sensors to detect presence and proximity of people in front of the Donor Wall.

Pressure sensors to detect if someone is pressing on a block.

Lighting Subsystem:

A lot of LEDs is needed to be installed on the PCBs to be our lighting subsystem. These are hidden as much as possible so that people focus on the names instead of the LEDs.

Controlling Subsystem:

The main part of the system is the controlling unit. We plan to use a microprocessor to process the signal from those sensors and send signal to LEDs. And because the system has different modes, switching between them correctly is also important for the project.

Power Subsystem:

AC (Wall outlet; 120V, 60Hz) to DC (acceptable DC voltage and current applicable for our circuit design) power adapter or possible AC-DC converter circuit

Criterion for success:

Whole system should work correctly in each mode and switch between different modes correctly. The names should be highlighted in a comfortable and aesthetically pleasing way. Our project is acceptable for senior design because it contains both hardware and software parts dealing with signal processing, power, control, and circuit design with sensors.

Project Videos