One of the major limitations of oxide semiconductors technology is the lack of proper p-type materials to enable devices such as pn junctions, light-emitting diodes, and photodetectors. This limitation has resulted in an increased research focus on these materials. In this work, p-type NiO x thin films with tunable optical and electrical properties as well as its dependence with oxygen pressure during pulsed laser deposition are demonstrated. The control of NiO x films resistivity ranged from ∼109 to ∼102 Ω cm, showing a p-type behavior with E g tuning from 3.4 to 3.9 eV. Chemical composition and the resulting band diagrams are also discussed. The all-oxide NiO x –Ga2O3 pn junction showed very low leakage current, an ideality factor of ∼2, 105 on/off ratio, and 0.6 V built-in potential. Its J–V temperature dependence is also analyzed. C–V measurements demonstrate diodes with a carrier concentration of 1015 cm–3 for the Ga2O3 layer, which is fully depleted. These results show a stable, promising diode, attractive for future photoelectronic devices.

The incursion of disruptive technologies, such as the Internet of Things, information technologies, cloud computing, digitalization and artificial intelligence, into current production processes has led to a new global industrial revolution called Industry 4.0 or Manufacturing 4.0. This new revolution proposes digitization from one end of the value chain to the other by integrating physical assets into systems and networks linked to a series of technologies to create value. Industry 4.0 has far-reaching implications for production systems and engineering education, especially in the training of mechatronic engineers. In order to face the new challenges of the transition from manufacturing 3.0 to Industry 4.0 and 5.0, it is necessary to implement innovative educational models that allow the systematic training of engineers. The competency-based education model has ideal characteristics to help mechatronic engineers, especially in the development of specific competencies. This article proposes 15 technical considerations related to generic industrial needs and disruptive technologies that serve to determine those specific competencies required by mechatronic engineers to meet the challenges of Industry 4.0 and 5.0.

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This article introduces a new kinematic modeling method used to analyze coupled rigid multibody movements. The method was applied to the study of a 5R planar parallel mechanism's kinematics and consists of analyzing two fixed configurations of the mechanism to systematize the rotational relationships between the two structures. Mathematical models were developed using complex numbers. The inverse kinematic problem was modeled as a system of eight nonlinear equations and eight unknowns, which was solved with Newton-Raphson's method. Subsequently, with the inverse problem model, a numerical database related to the mechanism configurations, including singular positions, was generated to train a multilayer neural network. The Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm was used for network training. Finally, an interpolated linear path was used to understand the efficiency of the trained network.