Information engineering is the engineering discipline that deals with the generation, distribution, analysis, and use of information, data, and

knowledge Knowledge can be defined as awareness of facts or as practical skills, and may also refer to familiarity with objects or situations. Knowledge of facts, also called propositional knowledge, is often defined as true belief that is distin ...

in systems. The field first became identifiable in the early 21st century. Intersection over Union - object detection bounding boxes

The components of information engineering include more theoretical fields such as

machine learning Machine learning (ML) is a field of inquiry devoted to understanding and building methods that 'learn', that is, methods that leverage data to improve performance on some set of tasks. It is seen as a part of artificial intelligence. Machine ...

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech ...

control theory Control theory is a field of mathematics that deals with the control system, control of dynamical systems in engineered processes and machines. The objective is to develop a model or algorithm governing the application of system inputs to drive ...

signal processing Signal processing is an electrical engineering subfield that focuses on analyzing, modifying and synthesizing '' signals'', such as sound, images, and scientific measurements. Signal processing techniques are used to optimize transmissions, ...

, and

information theory Information theory is the scientific study of the quantification, storage, and communication of information. The field was originally established by the works of Harry Nyquist and Ralph Hartley, in the 1920s, and Claude Shannon in the 1940s. ...

, and more applied fields such as

computer vision Computer vision is an interdisciplinary scientific field that deals with how computers can gain high-level understanding from digital images or videos. From the perspective of engineering, it seeks to understand and automate tasks that the human ...

natural language processing Natural language processing (NLP) is an interdisciplinary subfield of linguistics, computer science, and artificial intelligence concerned with the interactions between computers and human language, in particular how to program computers to proc ...

bioinformatics Bioinformatics () is an interdisciplinary field that develops methods and software tools for understanding biological data, in particular when the data sets are large and complex. As an interdisciplinary field of science, bioinformatics combi ...

, medical image computing,

cheminformatics Cheminformatics (also known as chemoinformatics) refers to use of physical chemistry theory with computer and information science techniques—so called "''in silico''" techniques—in application to a range of descriptive and prescriptive problem ...

, autonomous robotics, mobile robotics, and telecommunications. Many of these originate from

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

, as well as other branches of engineering such as

computer engineering Computer engineering (CoE or CpE) is a branch of electrical engineering and computer science that integrates several fields of computer science and electronic engineering required to develop computer hardware and software. Computer engineers n ...

electrical engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

, and

bioengineering Biological engineering or bioengineering is the application of principles of biology and the tools of engineering to create usable, tangible, economically-viable products. Biological engineering employs knowledge and expertise from a number o ...

The field of information engineering is based heavily on mathematics, particularly

probability Probability is the branch of mathematics concerning numerical descriptions of how likely an event is to occur, or how likely it is that a proposition is true. The probability of an event is a number between 0 and 1, where, roughly speaking, ...

, statistics,

calculus Calculus, originally called infinitesimal calculus or "the calculus of infinitesimals", is the mathematics, mathematical study of continuous change, in the same way that geometry is the study of shape, and algebra is the study of generalizati ...

linear algebra Linear algebra is the branch of mathematics concerning linear equations such as: :a_1x_1+\cdots +a_nx_n=b, linear maps such as: :(x_1, \ldots, x_n) \mapsto a_1x_1+\cdots +a_nx_n, and their representations in vector spaces and through matrice ...

optimization Mathematical optimization (alternatively spelled ''optimisation'') or mathematical programming is the selection of a best element, with regard to some criterion, from some set of available alternatives. It is generally divided into two subfi ...

differential equations In mathematics, a differential equation is an equation that relates one or more unknown functions and their derivatives. In applications, the functions generally represent physical quantities, the derivatives represent their rates of change, an ...

, variational calculus, and

complex analysis Complex analysis, traditionally known as the theory of functions of a complex variable, is the branch of mathematical analysis that investigates Function (mathematics), functions of complex numbers. It is helpful in many branches of mathemati ...

. Information engineers often hold a degree in information engineering or a related area, and are often part of a professional body such as the

Institution of Engineering and Technology The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) is a multidisciplinary professional engineering institution. The IET was formed in 2006 from two separate institutions: the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE), dating back to 1871, and ...

or Institute of Measurement and Control. They are employed in almost all industries due to the widespread use of information engineering.

History

In the 1980s/1990s term information engineering referred to an area of software engineering which has come to be known as

data engineering Data engineering refers to the building of systems to enable the collection and usage of data. This data is usually used to enable subsequent analysis and data science; which often involves machine learning. Making the data usable usually involves ...

in the 2010s/2020s.

Elements

Machine learning and statistics

Machine learning is the field that involves the use of statistical and

probabilistic Probability is the branch of mathematics concerning numerical descriptions of how likely an event is to occur, or how likely it is that a proposition is true. The probability of an event is a number between 0 and 1, where, roughly speaking, ...

methods to let

computers A computer is a machine that can be programmed to carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as programs. These prog ...

"learn" from data without being explicitly programmed. Data science involves the application of machine learning to extract knowledge from data. Subfields of machine learning include

deep learning Deep learning (also known as deep structured learning) is part of a broader family of machine learning methods based on artificial neural networks with representation learning. Learning can be supervised, semi-supervised or unsupervised. ...

, supervised learning, unsupervised learning, reinforcement learning, semi-supervised learning, and

active learning Active learning is "a method of learning in which students are actively or experientially involved in the learning process and where there are different levels of active learning, depending on student involvement." states that "students partici ...

Causal inference Causal inference is the process of determining the independent, actual effect of a particular phenomenon that is a component of a larger system. The main difference between causal inference and inference of association is that causal inference ana ...

is another related component of information engineering.

Control theory

Control theory refers to the control of (

continuous Continuity or continuous may refer to: Mathematics * Continuity (mathematics), the opposing concept to discreteness; common examples include ** Continuous probability distribution or random variable in probability and statistics ** Continuous g ...

)

dynamical systems In mathematics, a dynamical system is a system in which a function describes the time dependence of a point in an ambient space. Examples include the mathematical models that describe the swinging of a clock pendulum, the flow of water in a ...

, with the aim being to avoid delays, overshoots, or

instability In numerous fields of study, the component of instability within a system is generally characterized by some of the outputs or internal states growing without bounds. Not all systems that are not stable are unstable; systems can also be mar ...

. Information engineers tend to focus more on control theory rather than the physical design of control systems and circuits (which tends to fall under electrical engineering). Subfields of control theory include classical control,

optimal control Optimal control theory is a branch of mathematical optimization that deals with finding a control for a dynamical system over a period of time such that an objective function is optimized. It has numerous applications in science, engineering and ...

, and

nonlinear control Nonlinear control theory is the area of control theory which deals with systems that are nonlinear, time-variant, or both. Control theory is an interdisciplinary branch of engineering and mathematics that is concerned with the behavior of dyn ...

Signal processing

Signal processing refers to the generation, analysis and use of signals, which could take many forms such as

image An image is a visual representation of something. It can be two-dimensional, three-dimensional, or somehow otherwise feed into the visual system to convey information. An image can be an artifact, such as a photograph or other two-dimensio ...

sound In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as an acoustic wave, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid. In human physiology and psychology, sound is the ''reception'' of such waves and their ''perception'' by ...

, electrical, or biological. Use of Fourier transformation chest radiography

Information theory

Information theory studies the analysis, transmission, and storage of information. Major subfields of information theory include coding and

data compression In information theory, data compression, source coding, or bit-rate reduction is the process of encoding information using fewer bits than the original representation. Any particular compression is either lossy or lossless. Lossless compressio ...

Computer vision

Computer vision is the field that deals with getting computers to understand image and video data at a high level.

Natural language processing

Natural language processing deals with getting computers to understand human (natural) languages at a high level. This usually means

text Text may refer to: Written word * Text (literary theory), any object that can be read, including: **Religious text, a writing that a religious tradition considers to be sacred **Text, a verse or passage from scripture used in expository preachin ...

, but also often includes

speech processing Speech processing is the study of speech signals and the processing methods of signals. The signals are usually processed in a digital representation, so speech processing can be regarded as a special case of digital signal processing, applied t ...

and

recognition Recognition may refer to: *Award, something given in recognition of an achievement Machine learning *Pattern recognition, a branch of machine learning which encompasses the meanings below Biometric * Recognition of human individuals, or biomet ...

Bioinformatics

Bioinformatics is the field that deals with the analysis, processing, and use of

biological Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary in ...

data. This usually means topics such as

genomics Genomics is an interdisciplinary field of biology focusing on the structure, function, evolution, mapping, and editing of genomes. A genome is an organism's complete set of DNA, including all of its genes as well as its hierarchical, three-dim ...

and

proteomics Proteomics is the large-scale study of proteins. Proteins are vital parts of living organisms, with many functions such as the formation of structural fibers of muscle tissue, enzymatic digestion of food, or synthesis and replication of DNA. I ...

, and sometimes also includes medical image computing.

Cheminformatics

Cheminformatics is the field that deals with the analysis, processing, and use of

chemical A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., w ...

data.

Robotics

Robotics in information engineering focuses mainly on the

algorithms In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm () is a finite sequence of rigorous instructions, typically used to solve a class of specific problems or to perform a computation. Algorithms are used as specifications for performing ...

and

computer programs A computer program is a sequence or set of instructions in a programming language for a computer to execute. Computer programs are one component of software, which also includes documentation and other intangible components. A computer prog ...

used to control

robots "\n\n\n\n\nThe robots exclusion standard, also known as the robots exclusion protocol or simply robots.txt, is a standard used by websites to indicate to visiting web crawlers and other web robots which portions of the site they are allowed to visi ...

. As such, information engineering tends to focus more on autonomous, mobile, or probabilistic robots. Major subfields studied by information engineers include

control Control may refer to: Basic meanings Economics and business * Control (management), an element of management * Control, an element of management accounting * Comptroller (or controller), a senior financial officer in an organization * Controlli ...

perception Perception () is the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment. All perception involves signals that go through the nervous syste ...

, SLAM, and

motion planning Motion planning, also path planning (also known as the navigation problem or the piano mover's problem) is a computational problem to find a sequence of valid configurations that moves the object from the source to destination. The term is use ...

Tools

In the past some areas in information engineering such as signal processing used analog electronics, but nowadays most information engineering is done with digital computers. Many tasks in information engineering can be parallelized, and so nowadays information engineering is carried out using

CPU A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor or just processor, is the electronic circuitry that executes instructions comprising a computer program. The CPU performs basic arithmetic, logic, controlling, a ...

s, GPUs, and AI accelerators. There has also been interest in using quantum computers for some subfields of information engineering such as

and

robotics Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrat ...

References

{{Authority control Engineering disciplines Information

History

Elements

Machine learning and statistics

Control theory

Signal processing

Information theory

Computer vision

Natural language processing

Bioinformatics

Cheminformatics

Robotics

Tools

See also

References