Education

Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA): Engineering: Manufacturing Systems and Technology

Category Engineering, Materials Science & Engineering, Singapore, Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA), Undergraduate
Tags Engineering, Manufacturing, Singapore-MIT Alliance, SMA, Systems, Technology

The Manufacturing Systems and Technology (MST) degree programme is a comprehensive education and research effort that concentrates on enabling manufacturing systems and technologies for emerging industries in a global context. We define emerging industries as those based on new technologies that are just beginning to be considered for commercialization.  Currently, this includes a host of new concepts in micro-and nano-technology such as molecular diagnosis, advanced drug screening, new ideas for photonic devices, micro-robots, nano-scale optical devices, and a multitude of potential products employing micro-and nano-scale fluidics. At the commercial manufacturing-level these industries will be characterized by micron-scale product dimensions, high value-added, extreme quality requirements, mass customization, time sensitive distribution and entirely new business structures. In the immediate time frame our research will focus on an emerging industry that is now at the point of large-scale commercialization, namely: microfluidic devices for chemical, biomedical and photonic applications. While specific in nature, we also believe that the manufacturing issues for this emerging industry will have manufacturing process, systems and business issues that are common with many others yet-to-emerge industries, such as fluidic devices computation, advanced drug delivery systems and advanced health maintenance systems. Our research themes focus on critical issues enabling high volume, low cost, high quality products in the emerging industries of micro- and nano-manufacturing.

Programme Elements

For the Manufacturing Systems and Technology Programme (MST), there are three interrelated components:

• An Educational Program comprising a Dual Master’s degree, and a PhD. degree
• An Inter-university Research Programme (IURP) on critical system-level problems in mirco- and nano-manufacturing in a global context.
• A Flagship Research Programme (FRP) on critical manufacturing process issues in micro- and nano-manufacturing focusing on commercial scale production of microfluidic devices for biomedical applications. The Center for Polymer Microfabrication has been created to carry out this collaborative research.

Scope of Manufacturing for MST

In the MST programme we define manufacturing as the collection of technologies and systems that are necessary for commercial scale production and distribution to customers. This includes the disciplines of:

• Materials and Processes for Production
• Process Equipment and Tooling
• Equipment Automation and Control
• Metrology and Quality Control
• Design for Manufacturing
• Factory System Design and Control
• Supply Chain Design and Coordination

In addition, since commercial viability is a key issue, it is necessary to address the business economics of the new operations in these emerging systems. In MST these topics are treated as an integrated set, sharing common performance metrics such as cost, quality, rate and flexibility in all aspects of the system.

Career Paths

MST is a multi-disciplinary programme that combines the physical fundamentals of processes and equipment with the operational flow challenges of the factory. Graduates will possess a broad understanding of the many facets of manufacturing, as well as the strategic tools to become premiere leaders in technology development for existing and emerging manufacturing companies, research centers, or universities. Our goal is to equip its graduates with:

• An understanding of the fundamentals of physics, systems and operations
• Knowledge of specific technologies, as needed
• Tools for new technology development
• Exposure to manufacturing strategies

MST allows for many career options within the field of manufacturing. The M.Eng. degree from, MIT provides a broad base for those interested in moving into professional technical jobs in the operation of manufacturing industries. The NTU masters provides a first opportunity for deeper study in the manufacturing disciplines. This can lead to careers in the development of new manufacturing processes, equipment, automaton or logistic systems. Finally, the PhD degree will provide the necessary education for a future in advanced industrial R&D or for an academic career.