Chairman: Brunnel Olafson
Professors: Del Acluko, Hugh Baringar, Paul Chapman, Vossek Prim
All cadets must take at least one Systems Engineering course to fulfill their graduation requirements. Although many cadets take SE 102 to complete this obligation, many continue in systems engineering fields suited to their interests and future Starfleet career plans.
SE 102. Introduction to Systems Engineering
A survey of systems engineering covering all major shipboard and installation systems, including communications, transporters and replicators, environment, power, sensors, and weapons systems. Students learn to identify, use, and maintain these systems in day-to-day operations and emergency situations. Both real equipment and simulations are used in exercises to test the students' knowledge. Students run a Level One diagnostic of a simulated Galaxy-class starship's system as part of their final examination.
SE 114. Replication as a Design Tool
A survey of the development and use of replicator technology in the Federation's history. Focus on the use of replicators as industrial and engineering design tools for the development and manufacture of items. Students study early resin and virtual prototype technologies, conducting holographic matrix design work aimed toward producing an original design using replicator technology.
SE 212. Communication and Sensor Systems
The design and maintenance of transmission and reception systems covering the complete range of available frequencies, from subspace emissions through electromagnetic radiation. Cadets learn communication and sensor protocols, signal degradation and enhancement, and distribution of sensor time for maximum efficiency. Course includes a trip of the Saturn NavCon installation for an overview of operations using both sensors and communications.
SE 221. Shield Systems
A survey of the design and maintenance of force field generating systems, from starship shields to cascade force fields. Students examine the development of shield technology, the role of graviton manipulation in shield function, and the regeneration of shields under combat conditions.
SE 222. Security Systems
Students study technological systems designed to enhance and provide security, including security force fields, locks and access devices, dampening fields, surveillance equipment, and the maintenance of security devices. Students learn to use security devices in a variety of simulations designed to test their limits. As a final exam, student teams work to design security measures for a situation presented by the instructor, while other students attempt to bypass the security and reach a prearranged goal.
SE 328. Transporter Systems
The design and maintenance of transporters and related systems such as replicators. Students study transporter theory from the earliest invention of the system, through developments such as the elimination of transporter psychosis and the use of active-feed pattern buffers, to experiments such as subspace transport systems and Elway's folded space transport theorem.
Students experience suspension inside a transport pattern buffer, and study a complete transporter system and all its components. The use of transporters in emergency situations, such as high-warp transports and ship-to-ship transports at warp speeds, is also demonstrated and tested through extensive simulations and field exercises.
SE 330. Weapon Systems
An extensive survey of starship weapon systems, their design and maintenance. Students study standard Starfleet weapon systems such as phasers and photon and quantum torpedoes. The course also provides information on nonstandard weapon systems such as Romulan and Breen disruptors and Talarian Merculites rockets.
The capabilities of each weapon system are analyzed in various simulations, and students are provided opportunities to study the design and maintenance of each system under actual combat conditions at the Academy Firing Range. Students are expected to prepare a thesis comparing the uses of different weapon systems.
SE 404. Advanced Systems Design
A study of the latest developments in systems design theory and technology, and the practical and possible implementations of these theories in Starfleet vessels. Students visit the research and design laboratories of the Utopia Planitia Shipyards, as well as the advanced design and development laboratories of Jupiter Station to study the latest innovations, both in simulations and actual lab and field experience.
