Development of a Laboratory Practice with Closed-Loop Thermal Control Using Hysteresis and Peltier Cells

Abstract

This paper presents the design and implementation of a laboratory exercise primarily intended for chemical, process, and thermal engineering curricula, in which students construct a closed-loop thermal control system with hysteresis for a Peltier thermoelectric cell. To assess the cross-disciplinary transferability of the activity, the platform was implemented and evaluated with an interdisciplinary cohort of master’s students from mechanical engineering, industrial design and product development, and chemistry backgrounds, enrolled in the course “Instrumentation and Experimental Monitoring” within the Master’s Degree in Advanced Industrial Technologies and Processes and the Master’s Degree in Industrial Engineering programs. Students assemble a low-cost physical-digital system using microcontrollers (Arduino) and real-time visualization (Processing). The exercise promotes the experimental understanding of heat transfer phenomena, automatic control, and electronic instrumentation within a reproducible, accessible, and pedagogically meaningful environment.