Computer Laboratory

The laboratory has 10 personal computers. All of the computers have internet access and laser printing ability. Software in this facility includes: Microsoft Office 2000 including Word, Excel, Power Point and Outlook, Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000, Autocad 2000, ProE ver 20, Algor and Netscape.

Engine Power and Machinery

This laboratory provides a wide assortment of engines (gasoline and diesel) ranging in size from small single cylinder (2 cycle and 4 cycle) to 3 cylinder diesel, and 4 and 6 cylinder models. Two tractors are available for laboratory use (one gasoline and one diesel). Several cutaway engines are available as are cutaway models of manual shift and power shift transmission.

Instrumentation available for laboratory exercises includes: engine analyzers, dynamometers, a diesel test stand, temperature and pressure sensing, data logging, sound level, load cell, engine timing, flowmeter, stress coat equipment, strain gage measurement equipment, accelerometers, an acoustic flowmeter, exhaust analyzer, and LABTECH notebook software.

Machinery available for laboratory instruction includes: planter and sprayer unit test stands, tillage implement comparison unit, portable-electric hydraulic pump, and hydraulic components.

Analysis software packages available are ALGOR, DYNAPAK, LABTECH notebook, Campbell CR-10 datalogging and support software for programming, monitoring and file transfer, and Quattro Pro spreadsheet.

Prototyping/Research Service

This laboratory provides work space and shop facilities for students to develop and test prototypes (under supervision of faculty and department technicians) of design concepts or design project results. Facilities include: electric wire arc and gas welders, turning lathe, drill presses, shears and shaping tools, table, radial-arm and panel saws, metal-cutting saws, and a broad assortment of hand tools.

In addition to department facilities for these purposes, a laboratory in the Industrial Engineering Department provides extensive construction and fabrication facilities that are available to agricultural engineering students via appropriate arrangements.

Biological Materials Properties and Handling

A wide variety of equipment is available to provide student laboratory experience emphasizing integration of biological materials information with engineering applications. This laboratory includes equipment such as: Instron Universal Test machine with load cells, an experimental cross-flow dryer, an array of biomaterials moisture meters, precision balances and scales, drying ovens, a walk-in cooler, materials sieving and separating units, a computer-based dryer control system, a grain breakage tester, data logging equipment, and short or long-term on-loan commercial equipment for specialized testing/laboratory applications.

Environmental Measurements

This laboratory is in its early phase of development. This laboratory is being developed to serve teaching and research needs in environmental and natural resource management areas. Available equipment and instrumentation includes: chest freezer, acid storage, fume hood, distilled water, soil test, flowmeter, sensors (soil moisture, plant temperature, air temperature, solar radiation, wind velocity, plant chlorophyll, and plant water potential).

Instrumentation and Teaching Services Laboratory

This laboratory is not used directly by students in their laboratory experience courses. It is intended to provide space for centralized storage of instrumentation which can be easily moved and set-up in teaching laboratories as needed for specific laboratory projects/exercises. This laboratory provides work space for a department technician and associated student help to develop and prepare equipment/instrumentation for use in teaching laboratories.

This laboratory is also used as a teaching services laboratory to develop teaching aids, particularly computer-based teaching materials.

Electrical and Electronic Technology

Applications of this laboratory in ASM 354 and AGEN 358 include 4 electrical wiring booths for use with several electrical wiring exercises and demonstrations, wiring exercise panels, single and three phase power supplies, electrical meters, demonstration boards, and programmable logic controllers. Available instrumentation includes: digital and analog oscilloscopes, digital and analog multimeters, kilowatt-hour meters, wattmeters, ammeters, and voltmeters.

This laboratory also provides work space areas for AGEN 482 (Instrumentation and Measurements) exercises. Experiments in electrical measurement, signal conditioning, computer-based data acquisition, sensor and transducer operation (measurement of strain, temperature, humidity, acceleration, sound level, etc) and data analysis occur in this laboratory.

Other equipment available for laboratory instruction includes: power supplies, protoboards, a frequency generator, a frequency counter, data acquisition boards, 16 channel multiplexer, 8 channel multiplexers, and an AC motor load surveyor.

Software available includes electrical wiring demonstration and quizzing tools, software for programming and monitoring PLCs, PSPICE, and Micro-Cap Software. Software applications in AGEN 482 include LABTECH Notebook, Campbell CR-10 datalogging, communication and file transfer, rosette stress and strain analysis, Quattro Pro and ASEASY spreadsheets.

Food Engineering and Pilot Plant

Laboratory projects/exercises are not currently developed for the food engineering course in the Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering building. However, significant laboratory space and equipment is available as the result of major research activity in this area.

Bio-imaging and Sensing Center

This laboratory is in an intermediate phase of development. This facility is being developed to serve research and teaching needs for integrating emerging artificially intelligence technologies for biological and agricultural applications. This laboratory is housed in room 210B of the Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering Building.

At present, three PC-based computer vision systems and Sun' workstations with other electronic accessories (such as color video cameras, frame grabbers, video recorders, lighting research equipment, and lenses) are available in this laboratory. Additional computer-based motion control equipment and tactile sensors are also available. A multipurpose zoom microscope with fluorescence capability and a PC-based fluorescence spectrometer are recent additions to this lab.

Various computer software provides access to different artificial intelligence technologies, e.g., computer vision, neural networks, fuzzy logic. This computer software is SNNS' for neural networks, "Level 5" for expert systems, Optimas', ImagePro,' and Khoros for image processing and scientific visualization, and FIDE' is used for fuzzy logic.

The Bio-imaging and Sensing Center is committed to discovery, development and adaptation of cost-effective and workable solutions for problems in agriculture, food, feed, and fiber production, processing, and associated bio-systems.