UESTC1008

Microelectronic Systems
Course Guide
 Teaching Team

Dr. Sajjad Hussain

Sajjad.hussain@Glasgow.ac.uk

Prof. Roy Vellaisamy

Roy.vellaisamy@Glasgow.ac.uk

Dr. Jehan Akbar

Jehan.akbar@Glasgow.ac.uk

2 UESTC staff members to help with the lab delivery.

A team of 25 GTAs will be assisting in lecture and labs delivery.
 Course Aims

The aims of this course are to:

• give theoretical and practical experience of designing,
building and testing microelectronic systems with a
development kit for a simple microcontroller interfaced
with discrete components and external peripherals;
• develop skills in systematic design and
documentation.
 Intended Learning Outcomes
By the end of this course students will be able to:
• explain concept of embedded electronic systems and give
examples; describe a microcontroller (MCU), how it differs from
a microprocessor, how memory is organised, and different
architectures in common use;
• explain basic architecture of a modern microcontroller,
including arithmetic logic unit, program memory, data memory
and input/output ports;
• identify regions of memory map, which are volatile and non-
volatile; understand significance of memory-mapped input and
output;
 Intended Learning Outcomes (continued)
• introduce programming in C to enable the control of a modern
microcontroller;
• describe process of writing a program in C to control analogue
and digital input and output to and from a modern
microcontroller using an ARM mbed as the testbed ;
• connect LEDs to the ports and calculate the value of series
resistors;
• connect pushbuttons and explain the need for pullup resistors;
• write programs to control analogue and digital inputs and
outputs using an ARM mbed;
 Course Syllabus
• Introduction to Microcontrollers
– Architecture
– Memory types
– Addressing types
• Introduction to CMOS
– Diode as a switch
– P and N type MOSFETs basics
– MOSFET applications as switches
• DAC and ADC
– Basics
– Conversion formulae and examples
– Parameters like resolution, conversion speed etc.
• Serial Communication
– Serial vs Parallel Communications
– Synchronous vs Asynchronous Communications
– D-flip flop as shift register
– Serial to parallel and parallel to serial conversion
 Course Syllabus
• Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI)
– SPI link
– SPI timing diagrams
– SPI modes
– Introduction to I2C
• Asynchronous Serial Communication
– Asynchronous communication protocol
– Bit, Baud, Frame definitions
– Introduction to UART
• Interrupts, tasks and timers
– Pooling strategies
– Interrupt strategies
• Pulse Width Modulation
– Duty cycle
– Analog signal generation
 Course Syllabus
• Coding and interfacing with either NUCLEO-L432KC with embedded C
– ADC and DAC examples
– Interface with external components, sensors etc.
– Digital and Analog I/P and O/P
– PWM
– SPI interface
– UART
– Master-slave communication
– Interrupts
 Road Map

Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4

Real Time
Introductory Computing
Programming Systems &
Architecture
Team Design
Embedded
Project and
Processors
Skills

Microelectronic Final Year

Systems Project
 Method of Delivery
• Course consists with 12 lectures and 4 labs (please check
your timetables for detailed schedule)
• 2 tutorial sessions
• In class use of online interactivity tools – Level Up!
• We’ll use Moodle Forum for course related asynchronous
discussions.
 Remote Delivery Arrangements
• Lectures will be delivered online via zoom
• Short videos to be shared along with lecture slides
before the lectures
• Labs will be done in the physical lab spaces under the
supervision of UESTC academics and a team of
graduate teaching assistants (GTAs)
• Tutorial sessions will be delivered online via
zoom/face-to-face
• Additional support is available to the student by
directly contacting the lecturer via email.
 Drop-in Surgery
• At the end of each lecture session, I’ll be available online for
15 minutes where you can ask me any question (one to one)
• For questions that you may have outside this time, you could
post them on forum
• If the initial 15-minute time window for surgery is felt little, we
will arrange a separate 1-hour live session for Q&As.
• Feedback is important under current circumstances so pass
your comments/concerns, questions directly (preferably) to
me or through teaching assistants
 Course Schedule
Lectures
Week 1 Introduction to Microelectronic Systems Week 7 Pulse Width Modulation
Week 2 Embedded Systems, Microcontroller Week 8 Serial Communication
Week 3 Digital Input/Output Week 9 SPI
Week 4 ADC Week 10 Asynchronous Serial Communication
Week 5 DAC Week 11 Interrupts
Week 6 CMOS Switches Week 12 Timers and Tasks

Labs
Lab 1-3 Exercise 1-9 (Lab Manual)
Lab 4 Lab Project Demonstrations
 Labs
• Lab manual is available on Moodle under “Labs” tab.
• The assessment criteria for labs is given in the “Labs” section on
Moodle.
• During first three lab sessions you must complete all the lab exercises
• Specific exercises (milestones) are described in the lab manual
• You are required to complete questionnaires (lab report) at the end
of each lab exercise which includes
– Procedure
– Your C-code
– Main findings
• You will do an individual lab project after the lab exercises
 Lab Report

• This is what we would like you to record in your lab report (this should be written as you do the
experiment)
• Brief objectives of each experiment
• Anything special you had to do
• What you observed (fix printouts into your book)
• Calculations and the results
• The most important thing is to explain why you did something
• Why did you choose a given component ?
• Why did you do the calculation ?
• Why did you write the code in that particular way ?
• What you learnt from the experiment
• Imagine that you are explaining the experiment to someone else.
• What we donʼt want to see :
• Material copied from the instruction sheet
• Results written on scraps of paper to be coped in later
• Anything copied from someone elseʼs lab notebook at all !
 Design Project

• Individual Effort
• Idea for design can be your own or found by looking at other design
projects on the mbed website https://os.mbed.com, in a book, or
elsewhere. A list of topics is available on Moodle too.
• Creativity will be part of the grade, so your own idea is worth more as is your
variation on otherʼs designs
• However, you must:
• Write the code for the mbed yourself.
• Determine the components that are needed for the design.
• Construct and test the design.
• Describe the design during the demonstration.
• Work should be documented in your lab notebook
• Project assessment criteria is given on Moodle
 Labs and Project Timetable
• Lab session 1
• Getting Started with the mbed
• Register on the mbed website
• Connect to the mbed compiler website
• Run a program
• Start Exercises 1-9
• Lab session 2 &3
• Work on exercises 1-9
• Start planning for your design project
• Lab session 2
• Submit project proposal/description on moodle
• Lab session 3
• Identify components needed for your design/submit component request form
• Lab session 3
• Work on your project/help session, Submit your lab manuals.
• Lab session 4 (assessment week)
• Demonstrate your mbed based design project
 Continuous Assessment Deadlines

• 6 May lab report submission deadline

• 6 June project report submission deadline

• Marking schemes uploaded on Moodle

 Assessments

Closed Book Examinations - 75%

Final Exam
Closed book exam at the end of the semester

Lab Exercises & Project – 25%

Lab Exercises – 15%
Individual Design Project – 10%

Exams shall have questions from lectures as well as labs!

 Requirements for Grade

• To receive a grade at the end of the course, you must:

• attend all the labs (total 4 lab sessions)
• attend all the exams (midterm and final)

• If you fail to fulfil any of the above requirement, you will not receive grade,
you will be given “CW”.
• CW (Credit Withheld) means that you have not completed some part of
the assessment (exam, laboratory report, etc.) but can still do so before
the next academic year. Contact the course lecturer if you are in doubt as
to what you need to do.
 Resources

• Moodle: https://moodle.gla.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=27151
• Textbooks: You are not required to buy any textbook
• Recommended book for reference
 Resources
For more reading
Fast and Effective Embedded Systems Design
Toulson and Wilmshurst : Paperback ISBN:
9780080977683

BUT this is for a different MCU to yours !

Code tweaking might be needed!

Or, for using the MCU to do projects

https://os.mbed.com/cookbook/Homepage
 Tips to Help You Pass the Course
• Attend all the lecture and Lab sessions
• Lots of self-study
• Solve all the questions in the practice sheet, quizzes,
and reflect on the feedback provided in the tutorial
sessions.
• Solve problems from the book
• Solve past exam papers
• Spend time in the lab, write code, test it, change it,
play with mbed
 Other Key Contacts

• Teaching office contact:

Ruoli Zhong ruoli.zhong@glasgow.ac.uk
Xiaojuan Song Xiaojuan.Song@glasgow.ac.uk
• Laboratory contact:
Liling Liu lilingliu@uestc.edu.cn
• Lead GTA contact:
Xinghao Chen xinghaochen10@gmail.com
 Complaints Procedure
Follow below process to contact us (more information can be found on Complaints Procedure Policy)

1. Academic Team (course coordinator)

Dr Sajjad Hussain sajjad.hussain@glasgow.ac.uk

2. Programme Director

Dr Faisal Tariq (Coms) Dr Sajjad Hussein (IE) Dr Frederic Surre (ME)

3. Co-Director (GC-UESTC CEDI): Dr Kelum Gamage

4. Vice Dean: Dr Joao Ponciano

5. Dean: Prof. Muhammad Imran

 Finally, remember

YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR

SUCCESS

#UofGWorldChangers
@UofGlasgow