Penn EDS Board of Advisors
The Penn Electronic Design Shop Board of Advisors helps Penn EDS meet its service and financial objectives and provide continuity to the organization over the years. Compliant with the rules and regulations of the University of Pennsylvania Research Facilities and Resources, the PEDS Board of Advisors supports the Penn EDS Director when needed. The board will meet at least once every quarter to review finances and project load also in order to meet the requirements of being part of the Lab Core system at Penn. Minutes will be taken, and archived and these will serve as documentation for the annual report to the PSOM Cores due at the end of the fiscal year.
Below are the current PEDS Board members:
William Beltran, DVM, PhD, wbeltran@vet.upenn.edu
Yale Cohen, PhD, ycohen@pennmedicine.upenn.edu
Miguel E. Hernandez, MS ECE, herv@pennmedicine.upenn.edu
Service Mission
The Penn Electronic Design Shop (Penn EDS) performs a wide variety of projects requiring technical work and engineering design. The Shop provides consultation for the solution of problems related to experimental setups and the design and fabrication of any apparatus, equipment, or instrumentation used for research. The Shop is available to advise faculty, post-doctoral fellows, and graduate students regarding their experiments, research, or project work.
We never fully know what we can, or can not, do until we are given some idea of what is required. If we can NOT be of help, either because of knowledge, skill, equipment, or other factors, we state this directly. Despite our facilities and talents, while we can do many things, we can not do everything. At the other end of the spectrum, there are many tasks and problems, from simple to sophisticated, we handle quite easily. Generally between these two limits, most projects require some interactive communication to define, plan, and accomplish the goal. Over-riding issues are usually priority, scheduling, and expenses involved in any project or service.
Service Priorities
The Electronic Design Shop is a problem solving, design, and implementation organization established by the University of Pennsylvania to meet the needs of its researchers. The Shop also serves as the “Electronics Resource” of the Instrumentation Module of the Vision Research Center at the University of Pennsylvania, and providing service to this group is a high priority.
Time and resources permitting, the Shop can also provide work for other universities, research organizations, and corporations. Generally these outside services have, or have had, some relationship to the University of Pennsylvania. Representative clients are Monell Chemical Senses Center, Northeastern University, the Science Center, and Innovative Clinical Systems, Inc.
Service Areas
Electronics & Embedded Systems designs: The Shop’s main focus is the development and construction of electronic equipment and accessories for all types of research. If you have a project requiring micro-controllers and electronics, from a custom circuit to a complete system, the Shop can design and build it for you. The EDS is an electronics facility is equipped with the tools and software necessary to fabricate a wide range of circuits, controls and interfaces to develop a concept from a prototype to a final product. The Shop also provides complete documentation including schematics, parts lists, operating and calibration instructions, software, and whatever else may be required for a given project.
Mechanics: Beside the emphasis on electronics, the Shop also handles a diversity of design and construction projects involving wood, plastic, and metal; including hydraulic, pneumatic, motion, optical, and electro-mechanical technologies. Whatever an experimental setup requires, from simple stands and enclosures to custom human or animal interface devices, the Shop can design and build it for you. Special mechanical items the EDS can design or oversee but not manufacture are subcontracted Machine Shop for construction. The EDS has a close and mutual working relationship with the Machine Shop.
Computers: At the present time the Shop only handles computer-related problems and support where the computer in question is used solely for research or experimental applications or in cases where there is no alternative support available.
Software: The Shop supports firmware and software and its subcontracted National Instruments’ LabView programs. C and C++ support and Firmware authoring is available. Special application installation and program setup is offered depending on the purpose and the Shop’s involvement with the application.
Services NOT Provided
The Shop does not repair consumer electronic devices such as cell phones, I-Pod’s, televisions, camcorders, digital cameras, CD/DVD players, stereo equipment, radios, games, or any other personnel electronic equipment. Exception: Occasionally such devices end up in a research application. In such cases the Shop will consider evaluation and advice only on items valued more than $200.00.
The Shop does not repair or service test equipment such as oscilloscopes, multi-meters, pulse generators, and similar units. There is no exception as even the Shop sends out its own equipment for repairs and calibration or it is simply replaced. However, the Shop can often offer suggestions or provide equipment on-loan for temporary or in emergency situations.
The Shop does not provide repairs of industrial, commercial and/or research equipment, especially any item under warranty and/or still supported by the manufacturer. Exception: Any item of importance where no other is support available. Contact the Shop for evaluation and consideration
With the advent of University-wide, School and Departmental, IT (Information Technology) support, the EDS does not provide computer repairs nor desktop services. Exception: Support is provided for computers and systems specifically setup by the Shop. In addition, the Shop will consider computer problems when no other support option is available.
