Fostering Design Thinking in Transdisciplinary Engineering Education

摘要

Disruptive technologies such as 3D printing, artificial intelligence (AI), and robotics have changed how people think, learn, and work fundamentally. Engineering education must adapt to this digital transformation. There has been increasing interest in integrating design in the engineering curriculum around the world. While traditional problem solving is a linear and structured approach, design thinking is set by a human-centered innovation process which leads to better products and services. This concept is well aligned with the educational vision of transdisciplinary engineering. However, it is challenging to teach the mindset of design thinking for people with various domain knowledge. In this paper, the differences in how industrial designers and design engineers tackle a design project are explained. We intend to share a few successful examples regarding how design methodology captures customer requirements and explores creative solutions in the product development lifecycle within the current engineering curriculum. Also, the user experience research in response to the trend of cyberphysical integration is discussed. Finally, we conclude with the need for a holistic curriculum design in digital manufacturing as a case study to illustrate the role of design thinking for future transdisciplinary engineering education.