ECE Course Descriptions

Electrical and Computer Engineering (2009-2010)

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

Propositional logic, predicate logic, set theory, finite automata, temporal logic. [Offered: W, S]

A first course in physics which introduces basic topics in classical mechanics, heat transfer, waves, and geometric optics. [Offered: F]

Electrostatics; electric flux and potential energy; dielectrics, capacitors and capacitance; flow of electric charge and resistance; Kirchhoff's voltage and current laws; magnetism; magnetic materials and circuits; Faraday's Law and inductance; simple motors and generators; electromagnetic waves. [Offered: W, S]

Number systems. Switching algebra. Hardware description languages. Simplification of Boolean functions. Combinational logic, sequential logic, state machines; their design and implementation. Timing considerations. Implementation technologies. [Offered: W, S]

Coulomb's law and electric field, Gauss' law and electric flux, energy and potential, dielectrics, capacitors and capacitances, Poisson's and Laplace's equations, electric currents, metallic conductors, Ohm's law, Kirchhoff's voltage and current laws, resistances, electric energy dissipated, Ampere's circuital law, magnetic materials and magnetic circuits, Faraday's law, inductances, electric energy stored, semiconductors, pn junctions, Zener diode, diode circuits, ideal op-amp and op-amp circuits. [Offered: F]

Analysis of linear circuits. Voltage, current, resistance, capacitance, inductance, voltage source, current source, dependent sources, Ohm's Law, Kirchoff's Law, nodal analysis, mesh analysis, circuit transformations, operational amplifier circuits, time response, sinusoidal steady-state response. Preparing for, conducting, and reporting of laboratory experiments. [Offered: F]

Software design process in a high-level programming environment. Programming fundamentals, language syntax, simple data types, control constructs, functions, parameter passing, recursion, classes, arrays and lists, list traversals, introduction to searching and sorting algorithms, basic object-oriented design, polymorphism and inheritance, simple testing and debugging strategies, pointers and references, basic memory management. [Offered: F]

Introduction to embedded systems, review of engineering design and analysis principles, software development life cycle, integrated development environments, use of software requirements and specifications, unified modelling language and documentation, event handling, simulation, project management, project scheduling, testing, verification, and maintenance considerations. [Offered: W, S]

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

General seminar. [Offered: F,W, last offered Winter 2010]

General seminar. [Offered: F, S, last offered Fall 2010]

Application of computational methods to engineering problems. Introduction to scientific computing software. Number systems, errors and error propagation. Solution of linear and non-linear algebraic equations. Curve fitting. Interpolation and numerical integration. Solution of ordinary and partial differential equations. Introduction to optimization. Emphasis will be placed on algorithm development. [Offered: F, last offered Fall 2010]

Fourier series. Ordinary differential equations. Laplace transform. Applications to linear electrical systems. [Offered: F,W]

Triple integrals, cylindrical and spherical polar coordinates. Divergence and curl, applications. Surface integrals, Green's, Gauss' and Stokes' theorems, applications. Complex functions, analytic functions, contour integrals, Cauchy's integral formula, Laurent series, residues. [Offered: F]

Discrete and continuous signals, convolution, network equations, simulation graphs, Laplace transform, Fourier series and transform, frequency response of networks, z-transform. [Offered: F, S, first offered Spring 2011]

Quantum mechanical concepts, band structure, bonding in molecules and solids, energy bands; electrical, optical, magnetic and thermal properties of materials used in electrical engineering.

Computer organization. Memory units, control units, I/O operations. Assembly language programming, translation and loading. Arithmetic logic units. Computer case studies. [Offered: F, W, S, last Spring offering is Spring 2011]

Number systems. Switching algebra. Hardware description languages. Simplification of Boolean functions. Combinational logic, sequential logic, state machines; their design and implementation. Timing considerations. Implementation technologies. [Offered: F,W, last offered Winter 2010]

Microprocessor system architecture, bus systems, memory systems, peripherals, parallel interfaces, serial interfaces, analog interfaces, data transfer, synchronization, error detection/correction, testing and debugging. [Offered F, W, first offered Fall 2011, not offered Winter 2012]

Review of band theory and doped semiconductors in thermal equilibrium, charge neutrality, mass action law, recombination and transport mechanisms, Boltzmann relations, derivation of p-n junction dc and ac characteristics, charge storage effects. The bipolar transistor; derivation of dc and ac terminal characteristics, equivalent circuits. The junction field effect transistor (JFET) and metal oxide semiconductor FET, derivation of dc characteristics. [Offered: F, S, last offered Fall 2010]

Introduction to electronic signal processing; operational amplifier circuits; diode device and circuits; MOS and bipolar amplifier biasing networks; load-line analysis; diode, MOS and bipolar small-signal equivalent circuits; single-stage small-signal MOS and bipolar amplifiers; transistor switches. [Offered: F, W, first offered Fall 2010]

An introductory level course on circuit analysis techniques for use in circuit design. The course covers linear circuit analysis and design in detail and touches on extensions for circuits with simple nonlinearities such as op-amps, diodes and transistors. [Offered: F, S, last offered Fall 2010]

Amplifier biasing networks; integrated differential and multistage amplifiers; high- and low-frequency response; negative feedback amplifiers; oscillators; noise in electronic circuits; introduction to large-signal amplifiers. [Offered: F, S, first offered Spring 2011]

Data structures, abstract data types, recursive algorithms, algorithm analysis, sorting and searching, and problem-solving strategies. [Offered: F,W]

Programming paradigms, symbolic programming, formal languages, regular expressions, grammars, program translation, scope, control abstraction, data abstraction, type systems, storage procedures, code generation, program loading, execution. [Offered: F, last offered Fall 2010]

Concepts of operating systems and systems programming; utility programs, subsystems, multiple-program systems; processes, interprocess communication, synchronization, and concurrency; memory management, segmentation, and paging; loading and linking, libraries; resource allocation, scheduling, performance evaluation; I/O systems, storage devices, file systems; protection, security, and privacy. [Offered: F, S, first offered Spring 2011]

Energy resources and electric power generation. Power system structure: generation, transmission, and distribution. Power system components: generators, transformers, transmission lines, and circuit breakers. Power system analysis: power flow, active and reactive power controls, fault analysis and protection, power system stability. [Offered: F, S, last offered Fall 2010]

An introduction to the engineering profession, including standards, safety, background (Charter of Rights and Freedoms), contracts, torts (negligent malpractice), forms of carrying on business, intellectual property (patents, trade marks, copyrights and industrial designs), professional practice (Professional Engineers Act, professional misconduct and sexual harassment), alternative dispute resolution, Labour Relations and Employment Law, Environmental Law. [Offered: F, W, first offered Fall 2010]

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

General seminar. [Offered: W,S, last offered Spring 2011]

General seminar. [Offered: F,W, last offered Winter 2012]

Macroscopic approach to energy analysis. Energy transfer as work and heat, and the First Law of thermodynamics. Properties and states of simple substances. Control-mass and control-volume analysis. The essence of entropy, and the Second Law of thermodynamics. The Carnot cycle and its implications for practical cyclic devices. Introduction to heat transfer by conduction, convection, and radiation. Basic formulation and solution of steady and transient problems. Issues relevant to the cooling of electrical devices. [Offered: W, S, last Winter offering is Winter 2011]

Basic probability theory. Random variables. Distributions: Bernoulli, Binomial, Poisson, Normal. Statistical estimation. Hypothesis testing. Joint distributions and correlation. Regression. Goodness-of-fit tests. Moment generating functions. Central limit theorem. Statistical quality control. Theory of queues. Stochastic processes. [Offered: W, S]

Spectral density of deterministic and random analog signals. Thermal noise and the white noise model. Amplitude and angle modulation, generation and detection schemes, effects of noise. Techniques for handling digital signals including sampling and reconstruction, quantization, pulse code modulation and time-division multiplexing. [Offered: F,W]

Microprocessor system architecture, buses, memories, peripheral connections, parallel, serial, analog interfaces, magnetic storage media, data communications, testing and debugging. [Offered: S, last offered Spring 2011]

Synchronization and data flow; interfacing to sensors and actuators; microprocessor system architecture, parallel, serial, and analog interfacing; buses; direct memory access (DMA); interfacing considerations.

Design and modelling of digital hardware systems using a hardware description language. Development process. Impact of implementation technologies. Performance analysis and optimization. Functional verification. Timing analysis. Power analysis and optimization. Faults and testability. Reliability and fault tolerance.[Offered: W, S, first Spring offering is Spring 2012]

Review of band theory and doped semiconductors in thermal equilibrium, charge neutrality, mass action law, carrier transport, Boltzmann relations, silicon IC technology, p-n (homo) junction, heterojunction, MOS capacitor, junction diode dc and ac characteristics, charge storage effects, MOSFET, derivation of dc characteristics and capacitance, BJT, derivation of dc and ac terminal characteristics and capacitance, HBT, equivalent circuits, thyristor, and other devices. [Offered: W, S, first offered Winter 2012]

Amplifier biasing networks; small-signal equivalent circuits; single and multi-stage small-signal amplifiers; high and low frequency response; negative feedback amplifiers; oscillators; noise in electronic circuits; introduction to large-signal amplifiers, overview of digital circuits. [Offered: F, W, last offered Winter 2012]

Discrete and continuous signals, convolution, network equations, simulation graphs, Fourier series and transform, frequency response of networks, Laplace transform, z-transform. [Offered: W, S, last offered Spring 2011]

Programming paradigms, compilation, interpretation, virtual machines. Lexical analysis, regular expressions and finite automata. Parsing, context-free grammars and push-down automata. Semantic analysis, scope and name analysis, type checking. Intermediate representations. Control flow. Data types and storage management. Code generation. [Offered: W, S, first offered Winter 2012]

Introduction, basic concepts, process management, interprocess communication and synchronization, memory management, file systems, resource management, interrupt handling, concurrent programming. [Offered: W, S, the last Spring offering is Spring 2011]

Requirement analysis, specifications, software design, software development environments, testing, software project management, quality assurance and control.

Introduction, data models, file systems, database system architectures, query languages, integrity and security, database design. [Offered: F, W, first offered Fall 2012]

This course examines the protocols used in computer networks, with a focus on medium access control, network- and transport-layers. MAC protocols discussed include aloha, CSMA/CD and CSMA/CA. Routing protocols discussed include distance vectors, link state, source routing, flooding and multicast, routing to mobile devices and ad hoc networks, connection-oriented and connectionless routing, and the end-to-end argument in system design. Transport layer function will be examined, including reliable transmission, with focus on TCP. [Offered: F, W, first offered Fall 2012]

This course is an introduction to basic modeling and analysis techniques in electricity generation, transmission and distribution, including basic concepts in nonlinear system analysis and optimization. Functional descriptions and modeling of generators, transformers, transmission lines, loads and distribution systems are discussed. Power flow analysis techniques are studied in detail, from the basic equations to their use in power networks and electricity markets. Fault analysis and basic protection concepts are also discussed. [Offered: F, W, first offered Fall 2012]

Principles of electromechanical energy conversion. Rotating machines. DC motors. Induction motors. Synchronous machines. [Offered: F, W, last offered Winter 2012]

Vector analysis of electrostatic fields: Coulomb's law, Gauss's law, electric potentials, capacitors, boundary conditions in dielectric and conductors. Magnetostatic fields: magnetic forces, Ampere's law, inductors, and magnetic boundary conditions. Poisson's and Laplace's equations. Theory of transmission lines. Smith chart and impedance matching. Time varying fields and Maxwell's equations. Plane wave propagation. [Offered: W, S, last offered in Spring 2011]

Maxwell's equations; plane waves; time-harmonic fields; waves at planar boundaries; boundary conditions; reflection and transmission; transmission lines; electric fields in matter; magnetic fields in matter. [Offered W, S, first offered Winter 2012]

Introduction to control systems. Advantages of closed-loop feedback systems. The role of the system mathematical model. Block diagrams and signal flow graphs. The basic control system design problem, stability in control systems. Frequency response analysis techniques. Root-locus analysis. Elementary lead-lag compensation. [Offered: F, W, last Fall offering is Fall 2011. The course moves to 3A level in Winter 2012 and becomes offered in Winter and Spring. The first Spring offering is Spring 2012.]

Introduction to design-project management, the impact of technology on society and the environment, and engineering economics. [Offered: F, W, first offered Fall 2012]

Seminar preparing students for the engineering design project done in ECE 492A/B. Discussion of the requirements and available resources. Brief examination of design approaches, project-management issues, and illustrative case studies. Students form a four-person project group, determine a project topic, present/discuss it in class, and complete a project-approval process. [Offered: F, W, S, last offered Winter 2012]

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

Areas of research and professional practice in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Exposure to concepts from other Engineering disciplines. Support material for the academic term, cooperative education, and professional or career development.

General seminar. [Offered: S, last offered Spring 2012]

General seminar. [Offered: W, last offered Winter 2013]

Representation of signals, vector equivalent channel models, and design of signal sets, optimum and maximum-likelihood receivers. Baseband transmission techniques, intersymbol interference, and equalization. Waveform coding by differential pulse code modulation and delta modulation. Techniques of digital modulation and their performance tradeoffs. [Offered: S]

Entropy, lossless source coding, and data-compression methodology using Huffman coding, arithmetic coding, and Lempel-Ziv algorithms. Mutual information, channel capacity, and techniques for error correction using block and convolutional codes. Trellis-coded modulation. Direct-sequence and frequency-hopped spread-spectrum systems and applications. [Offered: W]

Fourier representations in discrete and continuous time. Discrete Fourier transform and fast Fourier transform algorithms. Sampling and quantization errors. Time-frequency tradeoff in short-time spectral analysis. Frequency and phase responses of digital filters by pole-zero placement in the z-plane. Design of digital filters by windowing and transformations from continuous time. Implementation structures. [Offered: S]

Overview of wireless communications including first and second generations of standards. Characterization of mobile radio propagation channels. Techniques of bandpass transmission for wireless channels. Multiple-access schemes and fundamentals of cellular communications. Wireless networks, mobility and resource management. [Offered: W]

Connection admission, switching, routing, and packetization issues in communication networks. Probabilistic description of network events and queuing analysis. Derivation of network-performance statistics from simulation experiments. Design tradeoffs and performance evaluation for connection-level and packet-level services. Examples in Ethernet, Internet, and asynchronous transfer mode (ATM). [Offered: S]

This course examines the upper layer protocols used in computer networks. These include TCP/IP, UDP and the ATM Adaptation Layer as well as network management functions. Facilities for large networks such as the Internet will be discussed (protocols, multimedia, compression, etc.). This is followed by an introduction to cryptography and information security. Elements of classical and public key cryptography as well as their implementations will be covered. Network applications such as electronic commerce and wireless network security will also be discussed.

Organization and performance of conventional uniprocessors, pipelined processors, parallel processors and multiprocessors; memory and cache structures; multiprocessor algorithms and synchronization techniques; special-purpose architectures. [Offered: W]

The theory and practice of Radio Frequency (RF) engineering, transmission lines, and scattering parameters; design of RF components (low noise amplifiers, power amplifiers, oscillators, RF power detectors, active/passive mixers, power amplifiers); properties and representation of noise; passive device design (microstrip lines, diodes, IC resistors, IC capacitors, and IC inductors); active device design (bipolar and FET's). [Offered: S]

Physical principles, design, and microfabrication technologies pertinent to input (sensor) and output (actuator) devices for multimedia applications such as document and video imaging devices, micromirror projection displays, and micro-electro-mechanical systems. [Offered: W]

Integrated system design, memory cells and systems, logic arrays, VLSI design methodologies, applications in digital signal and data processing systems. Low-power, low-voltage design issues. [Offered: W]

Switching characteristics of transistors, digital integrated circuits, including ECL, T2L, CMOS, BiCMOS. Low voltage, low-power and high-performance design issues. [Offered: S]

Design of analog circuits such as current sources and mirrors, differential, low-noise and feedback amplifiers, mixers and oscillators; applications of these circuits in areas such as A/D and D/A conversion and receiver front-end will be covered. [Offered: W]

Computer formulation of matrix equations for arbitrary circuits, active network analysis; sensitivity analysis of networks in the frequency domain; design of bilinear and biquad sections; cascade design; approximation methods for lowpass filters; frequency transformation for design of highpass, bandpass, bandstop filters. [Offered: W]

Introduction to selected areas of software science and engineering: data abstraction; object oriented approaches; real-time operating systems; translators; software specification, design and testing.

Introduces students to the requirements definition phase of software development. Models, notations, and processes for software requirements identification, representation, analysis, and validation. Cost estimation from early documents and specifications.

Introduces students to the design, implementation, and evolution phases of software development. Software design processes, methods, and notation. Implementation of designs. Evolution of designs and implementations. Management of design activities.

Introduces students to systematic testing of software systems. Software verification, reviews, metrics, quality assurance, and prediction of software reliability and availability. Related management issues.

Principles of distributed systems, networks and protocols, interprocess communication and remote procedure calling, shared file systems, distributed transactions, client-server architectures, network-centric computing. [Offered: S]

Introduction, data models, file systems, database system architectures, query languages, integrity and security, database design. [Offered: W, last offered Winter 2013]

Artificial intelligence concepts and techniques, including search, inference, knowledge representation and planning. Knowledge-based systems. Applications in electrical and computer engineering, with emphasis on design and maintenance. [Offered: S]

Principles of power conditioning. Switching characteristics of power semiconductor devices. Computer simulation of power electronic circuits. Analysis, design, and applications of power converters. [Offered: S]

Economic load dispatch, Kuhn-Tucker conditions of optimality, unit commitment, hydrothermal coordination, power-flow analysis, production simulation, power pools and electricity markets - models and design, calculation of reliability indices, deregulation and reliability, primary and secondary frequency control, steady-state stability, power sector financing and investment planning. [Offered: W]

Review of Maxwell's and wave equations: application of plane waves: reflection, refraction lossy medium. Scattering parameters, analysis of microwave circuits. Basic microwave circuits. Waveguides: metallic waveguides (rectangular and cylindrical); dielectric waveguides (slab and fiber). Antenna technology. [Offered: S, last offered Spring 2012]

Review of Maxwell's and wave equations. Application of plane waves: reflection, refraction in lossy medium. Scattering parameters, analysis of microwave circuits. Basic microwave circuits. Waveguides: metallic waveguides (rectangular and cylindrical); dielectric waveguides (slab and fiber). Antenna technology. [Offered: S, first offered in Spring 2013]

Fundamentals of electromagnetic radiation theory applied to practical antennas and radiowave links are presented. Based on practical system models for antennas and radio links, analysis and design of important RF/microwave and wireless communication systems are described. Special propagation effects and antenna behaviors in wireless communication systems (urban macro and micro-cellular, and indoor links) are covered. [Offered: W]

This course addresses the physical principles and circuit models for important optical devices and modules as well as their application in photonic circuits and systems. The main application focus is optical fiber communication systems and networks. [Offered: W]

Dynamic system modeling: linear, nonlinear, state-space, sample data systems, computer simulation, system identification. Discrete system stability and dynamic performance. Nonlinear system analysis, limit cycles. Digital control system design: emulation methods, z-domain, frequency domain, pole placement. Implementation of digital controllers. Laboratory projects in computer control of mechatronic and other systems.

Homogeneous transformations. Kinematics and inverse kinematics. Denavit-Hartenberg convention. Jacobians and velocity transformations. Dynamics. Path planning, nonlinear control. Compliance and force control. [Offered: W]

Review of feedback control design fundamentals; SISO controller parameterizations; the fundamental effect of MIMO interaction; introduction to state-space models in continuous and discrete time; SISO techniques for MIMO design; optimal control; model-predictive control design; state estimation; decoupling, MIMO PID control design; applications in areas such as aerospace systems. [Offered: S]

Individual and group work comprising the design activity and report-preparation phases of the engineering design project. The team-oriented project is to comprise a significant design experience based on the knowledge and skills acquired by students in previous courses and on cooperative work terms. Project groups reconfirm project approval, establish and maintain progress monitoring through a faculty consultant, complete the design work, and submit a written interim report. Groups also prepare the written final report and presentations delivered in ECE 492B. [Offered: F, W, S, last offered Spring 2012]

Communication component of the engineering design project. Submission of a written final report for the project work done in ECE 492A. Lecture-style technical presentation by group members in a one-half-hour time slot. Poster-style technical presentation with group members available to discuss the project. [Offered: F, W, S, last offered Winter 2013]

Special courses on advanced topics will be offered from time to time, when resources are available. For current offerings, inquire at the ECE Undergraduate Office or check the ECE website.

Team-oriented design-project which comprises a significant design experience based on the knowledge and skills acquired by students in previous courses and on cooperative work terms. Development of the design specification and plan documents, followed by the initial design work. [Offered: F, W, S, first offered Spring 2013]

Completion of the design cycle started in ECE 498A and communication of the engineering design work. Submission of a written final report. Lecture-style technical presentation by group members. Poster-style technical presentation with group members available to discuss the project. [Offered: F, W, S, first offered Winter 2014]

An engineering project requiring the student to demonstrate initiative and assume responsibility. The student will arrange for a faculty supervisor prior to registration. Students can propose their own topic. A project report is required at the end of the term.