GENERAL FOCUS MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
The discipline Mechanical Engineering envisions a future society and industry that are able to realise value creation making use of sound, efficient and sustainable technology. The objective is to generate fundamental knowledge and to translate this knowledge into solutions for complex multidisciplinary technical problems to achieve the sustainable development goals defined by the United Nations, such as sustainable industrialization and production, increased energy efficiency and use of renewable energy, good health and to foster innovation.
With our excellent research and education we obtained leading positions in three important domains, i.e. Sustainable Energy, Smart Manufacturing and Robotics for Personalized Healthcare. Our fundamental strengths in these domains are in energy technology, materials and production process modelling, and precision engineering. We therefore want to reinforce our strengths by investing in the following research focal points that form the basis of these domains.
Transport Conversion and Storage of Heat To balance the supply of energy with the consumption, heat storage is required on different time scales (including daily and seasonal storage). For this purpose compact heat storage systems have to be developed making use of phase change materials and reversible thermochemical reactions. Research projects under this focal point contribute to reinforcing the sound scientific base, and further expand the strong research line of Mechanical Engineering in this field.
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Manufacturing of Functional Material Systems The focus of the research projects under this focal point is a more fundamental understanding and modelling of material in production processes for engineered structures, with special emphasis on the relation between production conditions and the product’s mechanical properties.
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Next Generation Structural Materials Research projects in this focal point are aimed at gaining a deeper understanding of engineering materials design by multiscale computational analysis and data analytics.
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Robots have to interact safely with humans, be it in an industrial setting, in agriculture or in homecare situations to support our elderly. Flexibility of the robot not only applies to the control architecture but also to the mechanical structure. The UT is leading in the field of bio-robotics, and we will strengthen our leading position by increasing and extending our expertise in the fields of bio-robotics, manufacturing and agro & food. Of key importance is the interaction of the robotic system with its surroundings. The projects in this focal point are aimed at expanding the research on Robotics and work on fundamental changes in robot systems.
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