Remote laboratory

This article is about the use of telecommunications in conducting experiments. For India's virtual labs projectl, see Virtual Labs (India).

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Remote laboratory (also known as online laboratory, remote workbench) is the use of telecommunications to remotely conduct real (as opposed to virtual) experiments, at the physical^{[disambiguation needed ]} location of the operating technology, whilst the scientist is utilizing technology from a separate geographical location.

Benefits

The benefits of remote laboratories are predominantly in engineering education^[1]:

• Relax time constraints, adapting to pace of each student, if there was insufficient time in lab
• Relax geographical constraints, disregarding the physical locality of the student
• Economies of scale, as sharing labs allows sharing of large fixed costs of traditional buildings
• Improve quality of experiment, as it can be repeated to clarify doubtful measurements in lab
• Improve effectiveness, as student may improve effectiveness of time spent at lab by rehearsal
• Improved safety and security, as no risk of catastrophic failure

Researchers from the Labshare describe the advantages as being:

• Increasing accessibility to laboratories by a factor of 4 within 3 years, since current lab utilization is less than 10%
• Decrease fixed and variable expenditure by 50%, since faculty budget spends between 15-40% on lab infrastructure and personnel, around $400m per year
• Improve learning objectives and outcomes to support better learning
• Enhance sharing of knowledge, expertise and experience
• Reduce start-up costs of laboratories

The technology can be integrated into Moodle. This allows for economies of scale production.

Disadvantages

The disadvantages differ depending on the type of remote laboratory and the topic area. The general disadvantages compared to a proximal (hands on) laboratory are:

• Lack of hands on trouble shooting and debugging experience.
• Lack of equipment setup experience.

Future direction

Current system capabilities include:

• Online session booking, utilizing a database and online interface
• Authentication to satisfy security requirements
• Desktop, generalized screen for chat, emoticon, time limit, bandwidth limit
• Live lab camera which allows panning, tilting, zooming, showing, hiding, refresh
• Circuit builder (this is just simulative)
• Function generator (this is just simulative)
• Digital multimeter (this is just simulative)
• Oscilloscope (this is just simulative)

References

1. ^ Ferreira, Sousa, Nafalski, Machotka, Nedic (2010). "Collaborative learning based on a micro-webserver remote test controller", Bridgeport, University of South Australia, p. 10.

Related pages

• GOLC
• iLabs
• Labshare
• Lila Project
• Engineering education

External links

• Netlab from the University of South Australia
• Labshare
• MIT iCampus iLabs from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and wiki
• Remote Labs from the University of Technology Sydney
• Remotely controlled lab from the Palacký University of Olomouc
• iLabs from the University of Queensland
• iSES internet School Experiment System
• LiLa project - Library of Labs
• Online-Lab, Carinthia
• UWA Telerobot
• WebLab, University of Deusto
• iLough-Lab, University of Loughborough
• Remote Engineering and Virtual Instrumentation
• International Journal of Online Engineering
• Remote Operation of Engineering Labs - University of Tennessee at Chattanooga