The Department of Avionics aims to prepare Avionics Engineering students well-groomed in broad-base technical knowledge especially in the field of Avionics Engineering and capable of meeting industrial requirements and carrying forward contemporary research in continually evolving areas of Avionics Architecture, Radars, Guidance & Navigation, for Aerial and space borne systems and applications.
The term avionics emanates from combining aviation and electronics. The scope of Avionics not only encompasses the electronic systems installed on all Aerospace Vehicles, be it aircraft or spacecraft, but also ground based surveillance and support systems. Avionics systems include Fly-By-Wire Flight Control Systems, Human Machine Interface, navigation systems, communications systems, vehicle health management systems, sensors, networking, flight and air traffic management systems. With Avionics Systems constituting almost forty percent of the overall aircraft cost, avionics is a multi-billion dollar industry word wide and rapidly flourishing. The essence of Avionics is to design for Space Weight and Power constrained environment where safety criticality is the overriding factor. Resultantly, avionics engineering is applicable not only to air borne and space borne platforms but all autonomous systems where safety is paramount, self-driving cars being a prime example. The futuristic transportation systems like Urban Air Mobility and Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) will further enhance the scope of Avionics Engineering. Avionics Engineers are employed by Avionics Original Equipment Manufacturers, Avionics Systems Integrators, Airlines, Maintenance Repair Overhaul Centers, Unmanned Aerial System Manufacturers, Manufacturers and operators of Air Traffic Surveillance Systems, Air Forces, Space Craft designers, Aviation Regulatory organizations and designers of safety critical autonomous systems.
This degree program provides graduates with the technical foundation they need to enter the field of avionics engineering technology. It will prepare them to apply engineering principles, processes and practices to evaluate, analyze, design and develop avionics systems, and their maintenance. Focused on the in-demand field of airborne electronic systems, the four-year program encompasses the study of aerodynamics, propulsion, aerospace structures, digital communication, avionics network technology, radar, navigation guidance & flight control systems. The program imparts knowledge of basic engineering technology as well as practical avionics knowhow for readiness of engineers to cope up the challenges in the field faced by national and international organizations. Avionics engineering students also undertake the coursework, which is essential to understand how the data is processed by different avionics systems for control and effective operation of an aerospace vehicle. During the course of studies, they are also familiarized with flight data recording systems and transmission of real time information from vehicle to the controller.
The contemporary trends in aviation to make the air space denser and denser with a vast spectrum of aircraft ranging from small UAVs to supersonic commercial aircraft has opened a multitude of research areas related to Avionics. The safety criticality aspects of Avionics imply special adoption steps, Artificial Intelligence that is largely used in other systems is required to meet avionics certification mandates. Developing certifiable AI based avionics systems is a key research area. Development of Communication, Navigation and surveillance systems to make air traffic management of such a huge volume of hybrid mix of aerial platforms and their integration in National Air Space is another challenging area. Rapidly reducing space, weight and power requirements in Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) and small size satellites calls for developing small Multifunction Integrated RF Front Ends and Antennas. Concept of connected aircraft warrants robust and efficient communication systems for networked operations. Reliance on networks and increased role of software in systems also brings to focus the research required in Cyber Security of Avionics Systems. To make Urban Air Mobility a possibility in near future substantial resources are being allocated to conduct research in developing avionics architectures for the aerial platforms and supporting Urban Air Management systems. Avionics is a perpetually evolving field and in contemporary times numerous exciting research areas have emerged where avionics engineers can apply their expertise to formulate feasible solutions to impending challenges.