Purdue unveils the United States' largest interactive learning environment

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Purdue Polytechnic’s School of Engineering Technology unveiled its Smart Manufacturing Labs, which will allow students to work in an interactive learning environment inside one of the four new industry-focused facilities in Lambertus Hall.

In hopes of addressing the country’s need for manufacturing workers in the near future, Purdue partnered with several industry-leading corporations to develop a learning environment that aims to tackle those concerns.

“These labs dedicated today represent our commitment to manufacturing, one of the great wealth-creating backbones of the Indiana economy,” Ken Burbank, Head of the School of Engineering Technology, said at Thursday's unveiling.

“We live in a world where technology changes rapidly and manufacturing needs people who are skilled and can adapt to these changes. At Purdue Polytechnic, we're not just keeping pace with these changes, we are leading the charge,” Daniel Castro, dean of Purdue Polytechnic, said.

“We have all heard the statistics that by 2030, 2.1 million manufacturing jobs may remain unfilled, threatening the core of our industry. This skill gap is a clear call for action and Purdue has answered that call.”

Over the past five years, leadership at Purdue Polytechnic has worked toward developing a solution to this concerning issue, which is what led the university to establish the United States' first and largest smart learning factory.

Inside Lambertus Hall, Purdue University with the help of its corporate partners has created four industry facilities, the Smart Learning Factory, Continuous Process Lab, Industrial IoT Laboratory, and Smart Foundry.

Purdue has defined its smart manufacturing facilities as a glimpse into the idea of “Industry 4.0,“ which is the integration of information technology and operational technology, paired with a human-centric focus on advanced automation such as AI and machine learning.

Smart Learning Factory

The Smart Learning Factory is a hybrid cyber-physical production system factory, that allows students to design and develop smart manufacturing competencies in a learning environment.

The new facility contains several different machines that have wide-ranging applications and are common within the industrial ecosystem. The variety of machines opens up the potential curriculum expansion for all other engineering technology degrees.

The facility’s primary sponsors are Accenture and Microsoft.

Purdue Smart Foundry

Building on their decades-long relationship, Caterpillar and Purdue have partnered to create a functional foundry on the university’s campus.

Mirroring industry standards, the one on Purdue’s campus is a miniaturized version of a Caterpillar foundry, which will allow students to learn the trade of smelting and forging materials and components in a safe learning environment.

Students will be able to practice and experience the process of sand testing, molding, pattern making, ferrous and non-ferrous casting, manual and automated metal pouring and data collection, all in one facility.

The facility’s primary sponsor is Caterpillar.

Continuous Process Lab

The Intelligent Process Manufacturing Laboratory will allow students to gain real-world experience operating IoT technologies, enabling real-time monitoring with network-wide visibility and remote visualization of processes.

Students will be able to collect data, create databases and develop operational intelligence from manufacturing systems.

The facility’s primary sponsor is Endress+Hauser.

Industrial IoT Lab

The Industrial IoT Laboratory will allow students to design, prototype, test and implement their own embedded application in an industrial-like setting.

They will be able to collect and track data from the product or process they’re working on across a network using wireless, mobile and internet technologies.

This facility will give students an area on campus focused on helping and teaching them how to develop the next cutting-edge applications with cloud connectivity.

The facility’s primary sponsor is Fortinet.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Purdue unveils the nation's largest Smart Learning Manufacturing Labs