ECE seniors show off design projects at 2025 Engineering Expo
ECE Expo
In April, students from across UIC’s College of Engineering participated in the 2025 Engineering Expo. The event is the culmination of the years-long Senior Design course, allowing students to utilize the knowledge and skills they’ve developed at UIC to solve a real-world design problem.
This year, several teams from the electrical and computer engineering department took on projects related to the university itself and tackled challenges that could improve an area of operations at UIC.
Rackscope
Ethan Tornilla, Marcin Gruda, Aldo Lopez-Ruiz, and Dominik Wojtysiak created a system to assist in labeling server racks, a time-consuming process when servers are reconfigured. Typically, documentation of switches, jacks, and rack layout is done painstakingly by hand, so the team sought to automate as much of the process as possible.
They created a handheld device from a Raspberry Pi 5 that scans labels and provides a screen readout, and a USB-C charging port. A user of the device can correct or override what is displayed. Initially, the team’s accuracy was around 50%, but they were able to train the model to bring the accuracy up to about 80%. Battery life was also an issue; they had to add batteries to achieve the 5 volts needed to make their system work.
The team says the college’s IT team is excited for their tool, especially with the new Computer Design Research and Learning Center opening this fall–and the task that lies ahead to connect the building’s servers.
listening lab
AcoustiQ: Acoustic Chamber Intercom
The Acoustica team developed an enhanced intercom system for the Listening Technology Lab. Established in 2023, the lab is a joint initiative between the university, the ECE department, and the Discovery Partners Institute. The lab is led by Assistant Professor Ryan Corey, and researchers in his group are developing technologies that transform how people experience sound.
Teammates Kayla Gardner, Nikolas Gonzalez, Neftaly Lara, Moises Loera Martinez, and Thomas Tran developed a new intercom system that conforms to the requirements of the old system currently in use and to the needs of the lab. Their system uses wireless technology to connect to a host PC running Windows XP, running with the existing 9-volt and 24-volt power supplies. Their system had to read IDs in under two seconds and monitor real-time occupancy. The system also tracks who is in the lab and for how long, as users are charged by the minute for their lab time and pay a premium if they are external users. The team replaced obsolete key fobs with the university’s i-Cards, ID cards already issued to all students, faculty, and staff.
The team was one of three Best In Show winners from the department.
Other ECE teams
Another team, NCF Cleanroom Transponder Upgrader tackled a project similar to AcoustiQ, a new entry and tracking system for the college’s cleanroom.
The two other ECE Best in Show teams included Lane Logic: Optimizing Traffic, and V.I.S.T.A., Versatile Instrument for Sensing and Tracking Atmospheric Quality.
In all, ECE had three dozen senior design projects this year. About six were subject to NDA’s from their corporate sponsors and were not presented publicly at the Expo.