USC Professor’s Simulation Software program Teaches Programs Engineering Matters

In 2013 the IEEE Life Fellow created the Transdisciplinary Programs Engineering Schooling (TRASEE) paradigm, wherein professors use simulation software program to show subjects by storytelling and role-playing strategies, permitting college students to use their engineering classes to real-world conditions.

For that and different “pioneering contributions to model-based methods engineering, schooling, and industrial impression utilizing interdisciplinary approaches,” Madni acquired this yr’s IEEE Simon Ramo Medal.

Ramo was a pacesetter in microwave analysis who headed the event of Common Electrical’s electron microscope. Ramo served as a presidential chair and professor {of electrical} engineering at USC’s Viterbi Faculty of Engineering from 2008 till he died in 2016.

Madni says the award is “the crowning achievement” of his profession as a methods engineer. It’s significantly particular to him, he says, as a result of he and Ramo have been colleagues at USC.

From NASA to educating at USC

Madni, who grew up in Mumbai, grew to become captivated by the U.S. area program after listening to the 1962 “We select to go to the moon” speech delivered by John F. Kennedy at Rice College, in Houston. The president’s speech was designed to bolster public help for his proposal to land a person on the moon earlier than 1970.

Madni, who knew he wished to grow to be an engineer, determined he wished to be a part of the “area journey,” he says.

He moved to america to pursue a bachelor’s diploma in engineering on the College of California, Los Angeles. Discovering himself drawn to methods engineering after taking a UCLA class within the subject, he determined to merge his new curiosity along with his ardour for area.

After graduating in 1968, Madni joined Parsons Corp. in Los Angeles as a full-time methods engineer and analyst engaged on protection applications. At evening, he took graduate programs at UCLA, and in 1971 he earned his grasp’s diploma in engineering.

He went on to pursue a Ph.D. whereas additionally working full-time at Rockwell Worldwide’s area division in Downey, Calif., as a simulation methods engineer.

On the time, the corporate was the prime contractor for NASA’s area shuttle program. Engaged on this system was a dream come true, he says.

He developed a model-based evaluation program to just about check the efficiency of the shuttle’s navigation system. He additionally led the creation of a simulation program that analyzed the navigation system’s efficiency underneath completely different high-stress situations. Madni’s model-based strategy diminished the necessity for in depth hardware-in-the-loop testing and consequently diminished prices, he says.

After receiving his Ph.D. in 1978 in engineering methods with a focus in laptop methodology and AI, he joined Perceptronics in Woodland Hills, Calif., as director of synthetic intelligence and software program analysis, ultimately rising to govt vice chairman and chief expertise officer.

“IEEE is the premier engineering society.”

In 1980 he started engaged on a distributed simulation expertise for the U.S. Military. He led a group that was designing a program to coach troopers and permit them to finish follow missions in protected, digital environments. The Protection Superior Analysis Tasks Company (DARPA) and the Military sponsored the work.

On the time, the coaching simulators used have been costly to construct, underutilized, and rigid.

Madni says he had two targets for the brand new simulation system: to decrease prices, enhance utilization, and permit army personnel to switch the eventualities as wanted. The expertise he and his group developed did simply that.

He later returned to the simulation effort, this time targeted on enhancing it with immersive story-telling strategies. The mission was funded by the U.S. Air Pressure, Military, Navy, DARPA, and the U.S. Division of Power in addition to a number of aerospace and automotive firms.

Madni modeled the simulations after video video games and flicks, participating a number of senses to create extra immersive experiences for customers.

Right this moment the Military makes use of the 2 methods, known as the “game-based coaching simulations for part-task coaching” and the “VR-enabled distributed simulation system for collective coaching.”

Madni left Perceptronics in 1994 to assist discovered Clever Programs Know-how, an R&D firm in Los Angeles that makes a speciality of modeling and simulation expertise. He served because the startup’s CEO and CTO till 2009, when he joined the USC college as head of the interdisciplinary methods architecting and engineering grasp’s diploma program. Madni is the founding director of USC’s Distributed Autonomy and Clever Programs Laboratory, which conducts analysis in augmented intelligence, autonomous methods, cyber-physical-human-systems, and transdisciplinary methods engineering.

“My father had a ardour for schooling and instilled that very same ardour in me from a really younger age,” he says. “His dream for me was to sometime be a school member at a prestigious U.S. college. By becoming a member of USC, I’ve fulfilled his dream and have contributed to remodeling engineering schooling for twenty first century engineering challenges.”

Life Fellow Azad Madni [middle] proudly shows his IEEE Simon Ramo Medal on the IEEE Honors Ceremony. He’s accompanied by IEEE President-Elect Thomas Coughlin [left] and IEEE President Saifur Rahman.Robb Cohen Images

Educating methods engineering by storytelling

It was at USC that Madni developed TRASEE.

As an alternative of a typical lecture format, college students begin with a brief state of affairs and a technical drawback to unravel. Every member of a gaggle is assigned a job. The groups use a digital twin—a digital mannequin—of a machine related to the story to evaluate how nicely their efforts are succeeding.

Madni says the strategy helps college students choose up info quicker, achieve management abilities, and study to work with others outdoors their self-discipline and from different cultures.

“By taking summary engineering ideas and embedding them in tales, I’m in a position to talk the concepts to college students rather more clearly,” he says.

In keeping with a 2018 examine, college students who study by role-playing workouts rating 45 % greater on assessments than these taught by conventional lectures.

Madni has been acknowledged by a number of organizations for creating TRASEE. This yr he acquired the Nationwide Academy of Engineering’s Gordon Prize for Innovation in Engineering and Know-how Schooling. The prize features a US $500,000 award; Madni donated half of the cash to the NAE and half to USC.

Networking with engineers from completely different disciplines

Madni has been an IEEE member for 46 years. Since 1980 he has held a number of management positions and has offered papers at IEEE conferences worldwide.

In 2013, he cofounded the IEEE Programs, Man, and Cybernetics Society’s technical committee on model-based methods engineering and serves as its chair. The committee creates instructional sources, and members are concerned in standardization efforts. Members additionally hosted panel periods on the 2023 Worldwide Convention on Programs Engineering Analysis and offered analysis papers. As chair, Madni has led a number of collaborative efforts with skilled engineering societies together with Worldwide Council on Programs Engineering and the Institute of Industrial and Programs Engineers.

Madni can be an lively volunteer with the IEEE Aerospace and Digital Programs Society, the IEEE Laptop Society, IEEE-USA, and the IEEE Programs Council.

“IEEE is the premier engineering society,” he says. “It goes nicely past electronics and electrical engineering. It encompasses many disciplines together with biomedical engineering, management methods engineering, cybernetics, methods engineering, and engineering administration.

“IEEE being multidisciplinary makes it a perfect discussion board for networking with engineers from completely different disciplines.”

Madni says he enjoys mentoring aspiring engineering college students and younger professionals working in each academia and business. He says that is his approach of giving again and he enjoys serving to them to “notice and stay their dream as I did.”