Search result: Catalogue data in Spring Semester 2021

Electrical Engineering and Information Technology Bachelor Information
Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars
A minimum of 18 cp must be obtained from the category "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars".
Projects & Seminars
A maximum of 13 cp can be obtained from Projects & Seminars. Each course can be registered for only once.

Enrolment is only possible for students in the BSc Electrical Engineering and Information Technology from Friday before the start of the semester.
Places are allocated using the P&S application tool (Link).
Please only enrol for P&S for which you apply via the tool.
NumberTitleTypeECTSHoursLecturers
227-0085-43LProjects & Seminars: Clean Room Technology – Fabrication and Characterization of Photonic Materials Restricted registration - show details
Does not take place this semester.
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W3 credits3P
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveIn der Nanophotonik wird die Wechselwirkung von Licht mit nanometergroßen Strukturen untersucht. So entstehen beispielsweise winzige und zugleich ultraschnelle optische Schaltkreise für eine neue Generation von Supercomputern.

Im P&S „Clean Room Technology“ erhalten die Teilnehmer einen ersten Einblick in das BRNC Hightech-Forschungslabor der ETH und IBM Zürich („Binnig and Rohrer Nanotechnology Center“). Nach einer allgemeinen Einführung in die Nanotechnologie und das Arbeiten im Reinraum, werden verschiedene nanophotonische Materialien abgeschieden. Im Anschluss werden mit Hilfe der sogenannte Ellipsometrie die optischen Eigenschaften der Materialien gemessen und anhand von Modellen am Computer analysiert. Abschluss des P&S ist eine Präsentation der Resultate und eine kurze schriftliche Zusammenfassung.

Das P&S wird für drei Gruppen à drei Teilnehmer an zehn Nachmittagen verteilt über das Semester angeboten.
Wir empfehlen das P&S für Studenten im dritten Studienjahr. MATLAB Vorkenntnisse sind vorteilhaft, aber keine Voraussetzung.
Das P&S findet teilweise in englischer Sprache statt.
227-0085-44LProjects & Seminars: Understanding and Designing Modern Solid-State Drives (SSDs) Restricted registration - show details
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W3 credits3PO. Mutlu
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveNAND flash memory is the de facto standard in architecting a storage device in modern computing systems. As modern computing systems process a large amount of data at an unprecedented scale, a storage device needs to meet high requirements on storage capacity and I/O performance. A NAND flash-based SSD can provide an order(s) of magnitude higher I/O performance compared to traditional hard-disk drives (HDDs), with a much lower cost-per-bit value over any other SSDs based on emerging non-volatile memory (NVM) technologies.

NAND flash memory has several unique characteristics, such as the erase-before write property (i.e., a flash cell needs to be first erased before programming it), limited lifetime (i.e., a cell can reliably store data for a certain number of program/erase cycles), and large operation units (e.g., a NAND flash chip reads/writes data in a page (e.g., 16 KiB) granularity). To achieve high performance and large capacity of the storage system while hiding the unique characteristics of NAND flash memory, it is critical to design efficient SSD firmware, commonly called Flash-Translation Layer (FTL). An FTL is responsible for many critical management tasks, such as address translation, garbage collection, wear-leveling, and I/O scheduling, that significantly affect the performance, reliability, and lifetime of the SSD.

In this P&S, we will cover how a modern NAND flash-based SSD is organized and operates, from the basics of underlying NAND flash devices and various SSD-management tasks at the FTL-level. You will build a practical SSD simulator by refactoring MQSim, a state-of-the-art simulator for high-end SSDs, to support advanced features of modern NAND flash chips and essential SSD-management tasks. This will allow you to have the chance to obtain a comprehensive background of modern storage systems and research experience on system optimization with rigorous evaluation.

Prerequisites of the course:
• No prior knowledge in NAND flash-based storage systems is required.
• Digital Design and Computer Architecture (or equivalent course)
• Good knowledge in C/C++ programming language is required.
• Interest in system optimizations

The course is conducted in English.
227-0085-45LProjects & Seminars: Robotic Maze Solving with a TI-RSLK Robot (RMaze) Restricted registration - show details
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W3 credits3PM. Magno
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveMicrocontroller programming (C) – Peripherals Interfacing using a MSP433 MCU – Control of a Robot in a maze

The course will focus on teaching how to build and program a Texas Instrument robotic system learning kit (TI-RSLK). It is a robot kit, which includes a 2 wheeled robot, a line sensor to determine lines on the floor as well as sensors to recognize walls. The robot is driven by a MSP432 state of the art ARM Cortex M4 processor.

This course will give the students the opportunity to learn how to program the microcontroller of this robot to navigate in a small maze. For this, the students will learn how to control the motors and, consequently the movement of the robot with the peripherals of the microcontroller. Next to the movement, also the control and readout of the attached sensors will be part of the P&S course.

Once the students are able to read sensor values and control the motors of the robot, this course will conclude with a 4-week project. Within this project the students will design their own algorithm, such that the robot can navigate autonomously within a maze. A small competition at the end of the P&S will find the fastest robot of the group.

The course will be taught in English by the new D-ITET center for Project-based learning, the programming toolchain will be installed on the student’s own laptop. Experience with microcontroller programming (C) is an advantage, however not required. A short introduction will be given during the course.

This course will be taught in English or in German if necessary.
227-0085-46LProjects & Seminars: Embedded Systems With Drones Restricted registration - show details
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W4 credits4PM. Magno
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveMicrocontrollers - Programming in C – Drones – Autonomous Drones – Embedded System – Sensors.


Drones can be fun to use but understanding the hardware and software and building and programming them to be intelligent and autonomous is even better. This course gives the basis of the embedded systems having the drones as the primary target. The course will introduce embedded systems and, in particular, the microcontroller ARM Cortex-M, focusing on all the crucial blocks such as Interrupts, GPIO, ADC's, Timers, and Serial communication protocols. Apart from the core topics, real-time and power-efficient algorithms for attitude and motor control are also discussed, making the drone efficient. Finally, exciting drone exercises are supported in the course to experiment with the development kit. The course will end with a 4-5 weeks project where the students will make the drone fly with some specific goal. It is not required any previous knowledge except C language.
The course will be taught in English and organized by the new Project-Based Learning center.
227-0085-47LProjects & Seminars: Machine Learning on Smart Phone Restricted registration - show details
Does not take place this semester.
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W3 credits3P
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveMachine Learning with Smart Phone Sensors –Programming Android Phones – Neural Networks – Keras/Tensor Flow- Projects and App on smartphones

Smartphones have several sensors that can acquire much useful information, for instance where we are, what we are doing, with whom we are together, what is our constitution, what are our needs. Based on this information our 'smartphone' offers us the appropriate computational power to process them in loco without sending the sensor data to the cloud. This course focus on giving the bases of machine learning and embedded systems. The student will learn the tools to implement a machine learning algorithm, such as Tensor Flow and others in their android phones to have an advanced smartphone. The course will end with 4 weeks project where the students can target a specific application scenario. It is not required any previous experience In machine learning. Phyton is a plus but the basis of phyton will be given in the course to be able to complete the project.
The course will be taught in English and organized by the new Project-based Learning center.
227-0085-48LProjects & Seminars: Introduction to Program Nao Robots for Robocup Competition Restricted registration - show details
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W4 credits4PM. Magno
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveProgramming Robots – Sensors- Humanoid Robot.

NAO robots from Softbank are the leading humanoid robot being used in research and education worldwide. Robotics is the fastest growing and most advanced technology used in education and research. The main goal of this course is to introduce and allowing the students to learn how to program an NAO humanoid robot to make him walk, talking, watching objects understanding the human, and reacting to external input. The Nao Robots used in this course are equipped with many sensors: Tactile Sensors, Ultrasonic sensors, A Gyro, An Accelerometer, Force Sensors, Infrared sensors, 2 HD Cameras, 4 Microphones, and high accuracy digital encoders on each joint. It has two processors on board: an Intel Atom 1.6Ghz (The main computer includes SSD drive, WiFi, Bluetooth, and wired network) and an additional ARM-9 processor in its chest.
The course will introduce the software package and the full SDK and API. The students will learn how to program ( mainly in C and Phyton) the robot to access the full functionality. To improve the hands-on skills of students the course will end with a 5 weeks project where the students in the group will compete in a small soccer game where the robots will play the game following and kicking a red ball. It is not requested any previous knowledge but programming skills are a plus.
The course will be taught in English and organized by the new Project-based Learning center.
227-0085-49LProjects & Seminars: Smart Patch Projects Restricted registration - show details
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W4 credits4PM. Magno
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveWearable devices, PCB Design, Firmware developing, multi-sensors, Communication.

The Smart Patch project will design autonomous, low power and mesh enabled multi-sensor wearable smart patches. They will be based on the always-on smart sensing paradigm to continuously acquire process and stream physiological data in real-time. They can be trained to autonomously detect illness symptoms or other physical conditions, such as stress. The students will work in a team to design a sub-block of the smart patch. According to the students' background, they will be associated swith designing the hardware or the firmware. Together in a team, they will learn how to structure problems and identify solutions, system analysis, and simulation, as well as presentation and documentation techniques. They will get access to D-ITET labs and state-of-the-art engineering tools (Matlab, Simulink, Firmware development IDE, PCB Design, etc.) The course will be done in coollaboartion with DZ Center at D-ITET.

The projects will be done under the Smart Patches: a flagship project for D-ITET students. (pbl.ee.ethz.ch)
227-0085-51LProjects & Seminars: Hands-on Acceleration on Heterogeneous Computing Systems Restricted registration - show details
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W3 credits3PO. Mutlu, J. Gómez Luna
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveThe increasing difficulty of scaling the performance and efficiency of CPUs every year has created the need for turning computers into heterogeneous systems, i.e., systems composed of multiple types of processors that can suit better different types of workloads or parts of them. More than a decade ago, Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) became general-purpose parallel processors, in order to make
their outstanding processing capabilities available to many workloads beyond graphics. GPUs have been critical key to the recent rise of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence, which took
unrealistic training times before the use of GPUs. Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) are another example computing device that can deliver impressive benefits in terms of performance and energy efficiency. More specific examples are (1) a plethora of specialized accelerators (e.g., Tensor Processing Units for neural networks), and (2) near-data processing architectures (i.e., placing compute capabilities near or inside memory/storage).
Despite the great advances in the adoption of heterogeneous systems in recent years, there are still many challenges to tackle, for example:
- Heterogeneous implementations (using GPUs, FPGAs, TPUs) of modern applications from important fields such as bioinformatics, machine learning, graph processing, medical imaging, personalized medicine, robotics, virtual reality, etc.
- Scheduling techniques for heterogeneous systems with different general-purpose processors and accelerators, e.g., kernel offloading, memory scheduling, etc.
- Workload characterization and programming tools that enable easier and more efficient use of heterogeneous systems.

If you are enthusiastic about working hands-on with different software, hardware, and architecture projects for heterogeneous systems, this is your P&S. You will have the opportunity to program
heterogeneous systems with different types of devices (CPUs, GPUs, FPGAs, TPUs), propose algorithmic changes to important applications to better leverage the compute power of heterogeneous systems, understand different workloads and identify the most suitable device for their execution, design optimized scheduling techniques, etc. In general, the goal will be to reach the highest performance reported for a given important application.
Prerequisites of the course:
- Digital Design and Computer Architecture (or equivalent course).
- Familiarity with C/C++ programming and strong coding skills.
- Interest in future computer architectures and computing paradigms.
- Interest in discovering why things do or do not work and solving problems
- Interest in making systems efficient and usable

The course is conducted in English.
227-0085-52LProjects & Seminars: Satellite Communications Restricted registration - show details
Only for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology BSc.

Course can only be registered for once. A repeatedly registration in a later semester is not chargeable.
W1 credit1PU. Koch
AbstractThe category of "Laboratory Courses, Projects, Seminars" includes courses and laboratories in various formats designed to impart practical knowledge and skills. Moreover, these classes encourage independent experimentation and design, allow for explorative learning and teach the methodology of project work.
ObjectiveIn the P&S „Satellite Communication“, the participants will gain first insights into wireless communications. The topics link budget and antenna design are discussed. A particular focus lies thereby on applications.
ContentThe students learn how they have to build a wireless link for satellite communications in order to fulfil the technical requirements. Furthermore, the students will learn how to design antennas with the help of practical examples and create their own antenna design.

A quiz at the end will allow the students to check the gained know-how.

The P&S is offered for 12 participants on four afternoon within the semester.

The P&S takes place online and in English language.
Prerequisites / NoticeWe recommend the P&S for students of the third year.
Group Projects
NumberTitleTypeECTSHoursLecturers
227-0091-10LGroup Project IW6 credits5ALecturers
AbstractStudents must work in groups in supervised projects for 150 to 180 hours minimum. The topics of the group work are open and can be technical of specific nature or more general in the context of engineering.
Objectivesee above
227-0092-10LGroup Project IIW6 credits5ALecturers
AbstractStudents must work in groups in supervised projects for 150 to 180 hours minimum. The topics of the group work are open and can be technical of specific nature or more general in the context of engineering.
Objectivesee above
Internship in industry
Please note the conditions for Internships in industry as set forward by the "Guidelines for the "Laboratory Courses - Projects - Seminars ", see Link (German only).
NumberTitleTypeECTSHoursLecturers
227-0093-10LInternship in Industry Restricted registration - show details
Only for students in the Bachelor's Programme Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, Regulations 2012/2016.
For students enrolled in the 2018 Programme Regulations, see "227-1550-10L Internship in Industry" at Master's level.
W6 creditsexternal organisers
AbstractThe main objective of the 12-week internship is to expose bachelor's students to the industrial work environment. During this period, students have the opportunity to be involved in on-going projects at the host institution.
Objectivesee above
Prerequisites / NoticePlease note the conditions for Internships in industry as set forward by the "Guidelines for the "Laboratory Courses - Projects - Seminars ", see Link (German only).
Additional Subjects
NumberTitleTypeECTSHoursLecturers
227-0651-00LApplied Circuit and PCB-Design Information Restricted registration - show details
Number of participants limited to 24.

Although not strictly mandatory, attendance is of high importance and will be considered as part of the evaluation criteria. Students not willing to attend regularly to the lectures are not encouraged to register to it.

The deadline for deregistering expires at the end of the second week of the semester. Students who are still registered after that date, but do not attend the course, will fail to get the credits.
W2 credits4GA. Blanco Fontao
AbstractParticipants learn how to design a predefined electronic circuit and how to lay out the pertaining circuit board. CAE and CAD activities for design and simulation are carried out with the aid of Altium Designer.
ObjectiveThe goal is to become acquainted with all those practical aspects of electronic circuit and PCB design by working through a modest but complete application example. This involves analysis of specifications, the evaluation of electronic parts, efficient testing and failure search, electromagnetic compatibility (EMC), the usage of industrial CAE/CAD tools for circuit simulation and PCB layout, generating production data for the board manufacturer, board mounting, testing and start up.
ContentContent:
- Development - from the idea to the final product
- Analysis of given circuit specifications

- Searching the Internet for electronics parts
- Choosing electronic parts: avoiding mistakes

- Setting up the Altium Designer environment

- Structure of component libraries
- Preparing schematic symbols for CAE
- Preparing footprints for CAD
- Linking component libraries and databases

- Introduction to Altium Vault and Supply Chain Management

- Structure of schematic diagrams and circuits
- Assigning schematic functions to physical parts
- Capturing a predefined circuit
- Hints for improved testing and failure analysis

- Checking schematic data
- Simulation of mixed-signal circuits using Spice

- Introduction to PCB manufacturing
- Turning circuit schematics into a workable layout using Altium Designer

- Component placement on the PCB
- Manual and automatic interconnect routing
- Design for EMC and High-Speed

- Preparation of production data for the board manufacturer
- Documentation for manufacturing and assembly
- PCB assembly (component mounting and soldering)
- Final circuit testing and start-up.
LiteratureAll necessary documents will be available as electronic documents (PDF)
Prerequisites / Notice- The course is recommended to all students who plan to design an electronic circuit or a PCB in an upcoming term project or as part of their master thesis. Attending this course during the term before will ensure they are optimally prepared and will allow them to fully focus on their project.

- The number of participants is limited.

- For their own students and staff, the Department of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering provides electronic components and consumables free of charge. All other participants have to bear a 200 CHF fee for those items.
351-1138-00LPRISMA Capstone - Rethinking Sustainable Cities and Communities
Bachelor students get preferential access to this course. All interested students must apply through a separate application process at: Link

Participation is subject to successful selection through this sign-up process.
W4 credits4VA. Cabello Llamas, M. Augsburger
AbstractThe goal of this intense one-week course is to bring students from different backgrounds together to make connections between disciplines and to build bridges to society. Supported by student coaches and experts, our student teams will use hands-on Design Thinking methods to address relevant challenges based on the UN sustainable development goals.
ObjectiveIn this intense 7-day block course students will be able to acquire and practice essential cross-disciplinary competencies as well as gaining an understanding of a human-centered innovation process. More specifically students will learn to:
- Work and think in a problem-based way.
- Put their own field into a broader context.
- Engage in collaborative ideation with a multidisciplinary team.
- Identify challenges related to relevant societal issues.
- Develop, prototype and plan innovative solutions for a range of different contexts.
- Innovate in a human-centered way by observing and interacting with key stakeholders.

The acquired methods and skills are based on the ETH competence framework and can be applied to tackle a broad range of problems in academia and society. Moving beyond traditional teaching approaches, this course allows students to engage creatively in a process of rethinking and redesigning aspects and elements of current and future urban areas, actively contributing towards fulfilling the UN SDG 11.
ContentThe course is divided in to three stages:

Warm-up and framing: The goal of this first stage is to get familiar with current problems faced by cities and communities as well as with the Design Thinking process and mindset. The students will learn about the working process, the teaching spaces and resources, as well as their fellow students and the lecturers.

Identifying challenges: The objective is to get to know additional methods and tools to identify a specific challenge relevant for urban areas through fieldwork and direct engagement with relevant stakeholders, resulting in the definition of an actionable problem statement that will form the starting point for the development of innovative solutions.

Solving challenges within current and future context: During this phase, students will apply the learned methods and tools to solve the identified challenge in a multi-disciplinary group by creating, developing and testing high-potential ideas. The ideas are presented to relevant academic, industry and societal stakeholders on the last day of the week.

To facilitate the fast-paced innovation journey, the multidisciplinary teams are supported throughout the week by experienced student coaches.

This course is a capstone for the student-lead initiative PRISMA. (Link).
Prerequisites / NoticeBachelor students get preferential access to this course. All interested students must apply through a separate application process at: Link

Participation is subject to successful selection through this sign-up process.
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