There is nothing new about the fact that higher concentrations (up to 50 times) of valuable materials can be found in e-waste, compared to mined ores. Moreover, the constant accumulation of excessive amounts of waste equipment has a negative impact on the environment. The components found in electronic equipment may contain hazardous materials or materials that could be recycled and reintroduced into production processes, thus reducing the carbon footprint created by waste electrical and electronics equipment (WEEE). Sustainable e-waste recycling requires high-value, integrated recovery systems. By implementing a two-stage experimental sorting stand, this paper proposes an efficient and fast sorting method that can be industrially scaled up to reduce the time, energy and costs needed to sort electronic waste (e-waste). The sorting equipment is in fact an ensemble of sensors consisting of cameras, color sensors, proximity sensors, metal detectors and a hyperspectral camera. The first stage of the system sorts the components based on the materials’ spectral signature by using hyperspectral image (HSI) processing and, with the help of a robotic arm, removes the marked components from the conveyor belt. The second stage of the sorting stand uses a contour vision camera to detect specific shapes of the components to be sorted with the help of pneumatic actuators. The experimental sorting stand is able to distinguish up to five types of components with an efficiency of 89%.

Choosing and adopting in universities the appropriate Learning Management System (LMS) product is a difficult process. For many years, universities implemented their own LMSs or chose between Blackboard, Desire2Learn, Instructure Canvas, Moodle, Pearson LearningStudio, Sakai or other educational platforms. Recently, many new LMSs, such as Edmodo, Litmos LMS, TalentLMS, Docebo, are providing new facilities for content management and collaboration between users for a range of different devices (computers and mobile devices). Higher education must face challenges related to funding, global competition, while supporting students who are mobile and diverse. Efficient solutions must be found to solve those challenges. This paper presents a LMS solution implemented at the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, entitled ICE-Integrated Communication Environment, that combines locally developed components and software with applications from the Office 365 academic licensed suite. The initial implementation of the solution started within the DidaTec structural funds project that was financed between 2010-2014. The paper describes the configuration of the ICE LMS, the applications used for the management of content, collaboration between users (students, teachers), and several student assessment statistics from its usage.

The interest in teaching methods for Electrical Engineering (EE) education has been particularly depicted within Virtual Learning Environments. Applying a quality assessment and comparing the results with adjacent engineering fields may provide meaningful feedback on transferable teaching-learning skills. We adopt the perspective of the usability criteria as a quality assessment dimension that could augment a Technology Acceptance model and we investigate the integration of collaborative and productivity tools to support educational processes in EE VLEs. The case study has been conducted among the EE undergraduate students in the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Romania and results have been compared to the adjacent engineering profile of Electronics, Telecommunications and Information Technology, consolidating the applicability of such a model for VLEs.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems operating in the 860–960 MHz frequency range are widely used in applications such as supply chain management, retail, access control, healthcare, and transportation. This study presents the design, modeling, and fabrication of two antennas for this frequency range, followed by a comparative analysis to identify the antenna with superior gain. Key parameters, including corner fillets and chamfering, as well as antenna length, were varied to evaluate their impact on gain and S-parameters for the initial antenna considered the best from the two structures analyzed, aiming to optimize performance while minimizing size and keeping the frequency unchanged. Additionally, the antennas’ interaction with the human body was assessed through numerical modeling by evaluating the electric and magnetic fields and calculating the specific absorption rate for a human leg and hand in order to analyze the impact of these types of antennas on the human body. The dimensions of the initial structure were minimized while the antenna operated in the same frequency range, leading to a small decrease in the gain. It was discovered that when analyzing the values of the parameters of interest regarding the interaction with a human body, the RFID will not exceed them when considering the human hand, but it will harm a human foot when not placed at a specific distance from it.

Considering the improvements to modern communications and its requirements, antennas need to operate optimally at certain frequencies and have smaller dimensions. This study considered the optimization of two single antennas functioning at 2.4 GHz through geometry modification while preserving or even improving their bandwidth, while also considering their gain. At first, the research was conducted using numerical modeling and, based on the conclusions drawn following this analysis, the next step was the experimental analysis of the structures. Due to their different geometrical appearances, the optimized antennas were compared, and then an optimum two-antenna MIMO structure was determined for both structures using different methods to decrease the mutual coupling. The optimum structure was obtained for both antennas. The new antennas functioned at 2.4 GHz but had different dimensions, thus a study into the decoupling methods was needed to see if the same methods were best for both cases. It was determined that shifting the two antennas in the MIMO was the better method when leaving a distance of λ/2 cannot be considered due to an increase in the dimensions of the structures, followed by a 90° shifting of the antennas. Also, the modification of the gain representation was observed through implementing the different decoupling methods to determine their influence on the beamforming.