Smart Breadboard Platform for Circuit Verification in Electronics Labs

Description

Students are expected to build breadboard circuits accurately and verify their connections before powering them. However, they may make wiring mistakes or misplace components, while supervisors cannot continuously check every student's connections. This can cause incorrect operation, wasted time, damaged components, and reduced student confidence in building circuits independently. This project aims to design and build a smart breadboard-based system for electronics laboratories, capable of analyzing the constructed circuit, comparing it with an instructor-defined reference, and providing progressive feedback to the student. To achieve this, we will develop two main parts: hardware and software. The hardware consists of a smart breadboard whose holes can be isolated using electronically controlled switches. Each hole is divided into two electrically isolated sections, connected through multiplexers to a Wave Generator, ADC, and GND. The system first scans the holes to detect component pin locations. After determining which pins belong to each component, it applies different test signals between the detected pins and measures their electrical responses using the ADC. These measurements are then used to identify the component types and their values when applicable, using either a Rule-Based approach or a Machine Learning model. Once the components are identified, their types, values, and pin locations are sent to the software. The software reconstructs the circuit as a Digital Twin using Fritzing, representing its electrical structure and connections as logical nodes. The reconstructed circuit is then compared with an instructor-defined reference to identify missing or incorrect connections and unsafe conditions, regardless of the physical wiring layout. The system provides progressive feedback to help students identify and correct their mistakes before powering the circuit.