Digital skill requirement in 21st century engineering education

Dr Mukul Chandra Bora, Director and Dr Bhargabjyoti Saikia, (Assistant Professor, Dibrugarh University Institute of Engineering and Technology)

Industrial revolutions are never-ending stories of Human Civilisations and today it encompasses three industrial revolutions and the fourth Industrial are at our doorstep. It focused on Digital Manufacturing and Digitalization of all sectors of Industries and Commerce. As the engineers are the backbone of industrial development and hence there must be changes in the curriculum of engineering education without which there will be no trained manpower to run the industries complied with 4th Industrial Revolutions. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the process of the fourth industrial revolution as people throughout the world have been compelled to use those technologies without any objections due to circumstances. The changes in Engineering education is neither a new issue nor a new debate for the entire Engineering community and its reform is now a global crisis that is being brought into focus as the world begins to confront such transnational issues as depletion of natural resources, global warming and climate change, decaying of infrastructure, infrastructure security, natural disasters, etc., and as these, all are related to one-sided human civilisations and it is the duty of the human being to reverse all these disaster-related activities if we want to provide a better future for our next generations. People in industries thought that they do not fully understand the concept of globalization; have a firm grasp of the issues confronting the 21st Century engineer; lack the competencies that would enable them to rise to leadership positions within government and industry, and are not developing curricula that would train engineers to anticipate and focus on the rapid changes by which the 21st century will be at least partially defined. The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) is trying to quickly develop continuing education modules in order to best prepare the engineer for enhancing their skills to in turn enhance the profession and this concept is based on the concept that all engineers need to broaden their skill sets if they have to become leaders in business and public policy-making organizations. The different skill sets required to become an Engineer of 21st century may broadly be classified into three categories viz., Digital Knowledge or ICT Technologies, Cognitive Skills and Communication Skills this article will highlight the salient features of each category for better understanding of the students in particular and the entire community in general.

The different types of 21st-century Digital skills are (i) Artificial Intelligence, (ii) Virtual and Augmented Reality, (iii) Internet of Things (IoT), (iv) Data Sciences, (v) 3D Printing or Additive Manufacturing, (vi) Blockchain Technology (vii) Robotics and Automation, (viii) Cyber Security and the brief outlines of all the above skills are discussed here to understand by the common people.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) or Machine intelligence may be defined as the intelligence that is demonstrated by machines, in contrast to the natural intelligence displayed by humans and other animals. Some of the activities that it is designed to do are speech recognition, learning, planning and problem-solving. Since Robotics is the field concerned with the connection of perception to action, Artificial Intelligence must have a central role in Robotics if the connection is to be intelligent. Artificial Intelligence addresses the crucial questions of what knowledge is required in any aspect of thinking; how should that knowledge be represented; and how should that knowledge be used. Robotics challenges Artificial Intelligence by forcing it to deal with real objects in the real world.

Virtual and Augmented Reality: Virtual reality can generally be defined as a virtual object in a virtual environment, more precisely a simulation or an artificial recreation, computer-generated, real-life environment or situation, immersing the user by giving him the impression of experiencing simulated reality first hand, mainly by stimulating his vision and hearing. A good virtual reality system called The "virtual environment" (VE) will allow users to physically walk around the objects and to touch these objects as if they were real, that is to say, an environment which can be navigated and possibly interacted with, resulting in a simulation in time of one or more of the five senses of the user who is completely immersed in the real world.

The word "augmented reality" was first coined at Boeing in 1990 by the researcher Tom Caudell, who was asked to develop the costly labelling equipment diagrams and devices used to direct employees through the plant. He proposed to replace large plywood panels that contained wiring instructions individually designed for each aircraft, with a head-mounted device that displays the specific drawings of an aircraft thanks to high-tech glasses and projects them on multi-purpose and reusable panels [5], Since that time, AR has been used to enhance user experience in different tasks as it is a technology that overlays computer-generated improvements to an existing reality to make it more realistic significant thanks to the ability to interact with it, In other words, the technique of the Augmented Reality (AR) is the combination of real reality and virtual addition to it. AR covers a form of spatially recorded increase over the physical world. The user can see in real-time the world around him, composed of virtual objects. These virtual objects are integrated into the user's world using portable devices. The real-time interactive technology; gives the user the feeling that virtual objects exist among real objects as if he is in the physical world. For example, the user can see a virtual glass sitting next to a physical glass on a table. The most important aspect of AR is that the location of the virtual glass appears as real, solid and credible as possible than physical glass.

3D printing: Also called additive manufacturing, 3D printing consists of creating a physical object by printing layer upon layer from a digital 3D drawing or model. This is the opposite of subtractive manufacturing, which is how things have been made until now, with layers being removed from a piece of material until the desired shape is obtained. By contrast, 3D printing starts with loose material and then builds an object into a three-dimensional shape using a digital template. The technology is being used in a broad range of applications, from large (wind turbines) to small (medical implants). For the moment, it is primarily limited to applications in the automotive, aerospace and medical industries. Unlike mass-produced manufactured goods, 3D-printed products can be easily customized. As the current size, cost and speed constraints are progressively overcome, 3D printing will become more pervasive to include integrated electronic components such as circuit boards and even human cells and organs. Researchers are already working on 4D, a process that would create a new generation of self-altering products capable of responding to environmental changes such as heat and humidity. This technology could be used in clothing or footwear, as well as in health-related products such as implants designed to adapt to the human body.

Internet of Things (IoT): The internet of things, popularly known as IoT, is a system of interrelated electronic devices, mechanical or digital machines, any objects, animals, people etc that are provided with unique identification no (UID) and the ability to transfer data over a network without requiring a human to computer interaction. The IoT system consists of smart devices that use processors, sensors and communication hardware like mobile phones, an IP camera, a desktop or laptop etc, to collect, send and act on data as per requirement. An IoT device shares the sensor collected data by connecting to an IoT gateway, where data is analysed either in the cloud or locally. Sometimes, these devices communicate with other connected devices and act on the information they get from one another. The devices do most of the work automatically without human intervention. Some of the advantages of IoT are like, it has the ability to access information from anywhere at any time. It improves communication between connected electronic devices. It can transfer data packets over a connected network saving time and money etc. For example- A "Smart Home System" is working mainly over IoT technology.

Data Sciences: The field called "data science" is not an old concept. It was developed around 2008 when big companies realized the need for digitally organizing and analysing the huge amount of data in a systematic way. In 2009, in an article, Google's chief economist Hal Varian predict the importance of Data Science for future industrial development or any other sectors. An experienced data scientist can able to identify required questions, accordingly collect data from different data sources, then organize the information in a systematic way, representing results in the solutions and communicating their findings in such a way that, a correct business decision can be taken based on it. Therefore, now a day's for a successful business, their skills are required in almost all industries, causing skilled scientists to be increasingly valuable for modern companies.

Blockchain Technology: In this digital world when we talk about secure communication to transmit any type of information between two or more parties then it is possible only by the cryptographic algorithms. This "Blockchain Technology" we can say is one of the advanced versions of these types of cryptographic algorithms to encrypt the data and information. In the blockchain, a progressively growing list of records is called a 'block', that are linked together using a cryptographic algorithm. Each block contains a cryptographic function which is known as 'Hash' of the previous block. So any change in any block of the data can be detected very easily which make the communication very secure. The first modern Blockchain concept was developed by a person known as Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008. Nowadays there are different types of blockchain technology are there. Accordingly, there are different applications also. The Cryptocurrencies like BitCoin, Dogecoin, Ethereum etc are popular applications of Blockchain Technology. Nowadays in other sectors like various Financial Services, Online Games, Domain Names etc this technology is used successfully. So, in the coming years, Blockchain Technology is going to be one of the most demanding fields of interest.

Robotics and Automation: In today's world everybody know the word 'Robot'. We know that it is one of the artificial intelligent-based electromechanical devices. So we can say that 'Robotics' is the intersection of science, engineering and technology that produces robots that substitute for human actions. However, nowadays many Robots are manufactured influenced by different animals also. For example, a 'Robot Dog', very small 'Robot Ant' etc. As per record, in 2005, 90% of all robots are used in automobile industries. These robots consist mainly of mechanical arms tasked with welding or screwing on certain parts of a car. But gradually the scenario is changed. Today, we are seeing an evolved and expanded definition of robotics that includes the development, creation and use of robots for different sectors like healthcare, shopping marts, extracting poisons, security services etc. So with the development of electronic technology very soon almost in a huge part of our lives the robots going to take a very important role in near future.

Like Robotics, the concept of 'Automation' is going to be very important in the modern world. The word 'Automation' indicates the technique of making an apparatus, a process, or a system operate automatically. With the development of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning etc the present application of automation is increased continuously in various industries as well as in different daily life activities. Automation provides benefits to almost all industries. Here there are some examples like manufacturing including food and pharmaceutical, chemical and petroleum etc, transportation, utilities including water and wastewater, oil and gas, electric power, telecommunications etc, defence, facility operations including security, environmental control etc and many others.

Cyber Security: Online Banking, Net Banking, Mobile Banking, Online Marketing, UPI, Social Networking etc., are the very common technology that we use in our present time. But in so many online applications, our data need to be secure from a 'Third Party' attack, which is popularly known as the 'Cyber Attack'. So the term 'Cyber Security' means the technology that prevents a possible cyber attack. Nowadays most cyber attacks are automated and aim to exploit common vulnerabilities rather than specific websites or organisations. So accordingly with an increase of the information transmission and application in various sectors of our life, over the years the demand for Cyber Security has also increased day by day. Some of the most common cyber threats are Malware, Backdoors, DDos attack etc. So skill required by the professionals in this sector includes-Critical Infrastructure cyber security, Network Security, Cloud security, IoT security and Application Security. So, skilled professionals in the field of cyber security are very must essential for today's world. They also open vital possibilities for the present students to acquire knowledge and skills in these fields.

From the above discussion, it is observed that to become employable in Industry 4.0 complement industries and organisations the above skills are to be imparted to the engineering students, besides the core engineering curriculum. It is important to note that the above-mentioned skills are although seems to be digital or ICT-based skills but are the fundamental requirements to make our engineers employable in the 21st century. Moreover, all the students have to acquire some cognitive skills as well as innovation so that we can prepare our students to become part of the global workforce. The All India Council for Technical Education as well as the Ministry of Education, Government has already taken up the initiatives to train the Teachers of Technical Education of the Nation through different programmes including the externally aided flagship programme Technical Education Quality Improvement Programme (TEQIP-III) and a few teachers were trained from the state of Assam too. The Government of Assam should put a major emphasis on this issue of skilling, un-skilling and reskilling of the teachers of engineering institutions so that we may be at per with the other parts of the country otherwise the days are not far when the Engineering Curriculum of our state will become unattractive to our own students. It is important to note that these skill-based undergraduate programmes like B Tech in Data Sciences, B Tech in Cyber security etc., has already been started by reputed private Universities and Engineering Colleges in India.