Active research projects

The central goal of "CarryMeHome" is to bring people and shopping goods to their destination as energy-efficiently, energy- and time-savingly, safely, seamlessly and barrier-free as possible. At the same time, the urban quality of life for visitors and residents is to be enhanced by traffic calming. At the same time, there should be no loss, but on the contrary, an enhancement of (commercial) usability. The neighbouring rural zones up to a distance of at least 10 km should be connected by soft or active mobility.

The aim of this research project is to assess the occupant injury risk in side crash tests using virtual human body models.

The aim of this research project is to test cells under real boundary conditions.

The aim of this research project is to develop a device that is able to represent the intrusion kinematics as observed in a full vehicle crash in the IIHSside impact test.

The aim of this research project is the integration of a new airbag model for side impact into an existing occupant simulation model.

NEMO project aims at advancing the state of the art of battery management systems (BMS) by engaging advanced physics-based and data-driven battery models and state estimation techniques. Towards achieving this goal, the consortium tends to provide efficient software and hardware to handle, host, process, and execute these approaches within high-end local processors and cloud computing.

The project objective is to develop design guidelines (referred to as NSK design guidelines in the project) for the development of sustainable, safe and cost-optimised EPTW traction batteries. The NSK design guidelines contain proposals and guidelines to comprehensively improve the sustainability, safety and costs of EPTW traction batteries already in an early development phase. The application case of an electric motorbike is considered.

In view of the growing quantities of discarded battery systems, the development of highly automated recycling facilities will be essential in the future. However, the progressive diversification of battery systems poses major challenges for the recycling processes. A major problem is that there is currently no mandatory labelling system that provides information about the composition of lithium-ion batteries. As a result, the lack of labelling leads to impure fractions. In practice, there are three main recycling approaches - pyrometallurgical recycling - hydrometallurgical recycling - direct (mechanical) recycling Mechanical recycling in particular offers a high potential to generate a high-quality, sustainable and recyclable material stream. The research priorities planned in the BATTBOX project include technological research and plant engineering concepts that should lead to an increase in the degree of maturity in the mechanical recycling of lithium-ion battery systems. The research project aims at a multi-stage recycling process, whereby a broad spectrum of possible processes is to be developed due to the non-existing standardisations (chemistry, design, dismantlability). In each recycling process stage, a diagnosis of the exposed components is carried out with the aim of checking them for reusability according to economic and safety-critical aspects. Components that are classified as undamaged or reusable are discharged from the recycling process and not processed/dismantled any further. By splitting end-of-life components and reusable components, a significant product intensification of the original battery is achieved. High-quality and unmixed raw material fractions or components are obtained that are suitable for reuse in the production process.

The aim of this research project is the scientific investigation of the behaviour of running gears in abstracted dynamic principle tests.

In addition to the controlled ageing of complete vehicle batteries, the aim of this research project is to analyse the safety behaviour of the batteries over the entire service life and to further develop test cycles, test conditions and test protocols in order to continuously advance the development of electrical energy storage systems.

The central goal of the project is the production of components for conventional road vehicles and aircraft from largely bio-based resource-efficient wood-hybrid materials.

Wood shows a wide range of strengths. Under longitudinal tensile loads, hardwood - such as birch - has a strength of up to 140MPa. However, under shear loads (‘rolling shear’), it only exhibits a strength of around 4MPa. Especially with materials made of rotary cut veneers, this failure is provoked by production-induced damage (so-called "lathe checks"). In the case of plywoods or laminated veneer lumber, rolling shear failure therefore frequently observed - in particular when the plywood features high-strength face layers, e.g. of GRP or CFRP. In civil engineering, the tensile failure of concrete structures or the transverse tensile failure of wooden structures is tackled by inserting tension rods (reinforcements) or bolts. Though tension rods could prevent rolling shear failure and delamination in veneer laminates, a similar approach was so far not adopted here. The "Stitch!" project is investigating whether tension rods can be inserted through sewing-threads. The research hypotheses of the project "Stitch!" are: can be avoided or delayed. This significantly increases the bending strength and also the energy absorption in the case of bending impact loads. The sewing of veneers is already used in furniture design as a joining technique or for aesthetic reasons. In "Stitch!", the targeted strengthening of materials through sewing of veneers is investigated.

The objective of this research project is to objectively examine different assistance systems for effectiveness and acceptance and to assess to what extent accidents between cyclists and trucks could be avoided or the consequences of accidents could be mitigated.

The objective is to improve the safety of children as pedestrians in accidents with trucks. For this purpose, pedestrian behaviour is investigated in a multi-method approach. Accidents and dangerous situations are analysed and the underlying factors and their interaction are identified.

Systematic testing and validation of automated driving functions is one of the keys to bringing this technology to market maturity. In addition to the advantage of being closer to reality, road testing has the disadvantage that the time and cost required for complex automation levels for SAE Level 3+ is enormous. Currently, many institutions are working to largely replace road testing with X-in-the-loop methods ranging from virtual simulation (model-in-the-loop), component test benches (simulation, hardware, processor-in-the-loop) and whole vehicle test benches (human-in-the-loop, vehicle-in-the-loop). One of the greatest challenges is to reproduce the complex interaction between ADAS/AD sensor technology, vehicle guidance algorithms and vehicle actuators (drive, brake, steering) with sufficient realism on a test bench. The generation of relevant driving scenarios in scenario-based testing also turns out to be complex, since the criticality and relevance of scenarios are difficult to describe. The project is concerned with the systematic testing of automated driving functions on a test bench concept developed specifically for the project. It enables overall vehicle integration and provides test capabilities for automated driving functions, the entire powertrain and highly dynamic driving maneuvers at the limit. For this purpose, an existing simulation environment is applied to a complete vehicle test bench with hard real-time in a first step. Available sensor models and sensor stimulators are implemented on the test bench and validated in detail with test drives under different environmental conditions. Driving on the already modeled in detail highway section of the A2 Graz-West to Laßnitzhöhe is chosen as scenario. A validated traffic flow simulation generates realistic behavior of vehicles of the surrounding traffic. These scenarios are extended with critical situations by so-called "stress testing" and determined representatively from an in-depth analysis of accident databases. The project concludes with an impact analysis of the presented concept, which demonstrates the efficient development of alternative powertrains, vehicle dynamics control systems and automated driving functions. The innovation lies in the enormous closeness to reality which is achieved by real-time behavior of all components, digitalization of real routes, traffic flows and accident data as well as validation and verification of the system. Currently, there are no standards or laws governing the approval of automated vehicles, and the development of the test bench with the highest level of realism in the world also means the opportunity to play an influential role here.

The aim of this project is the simulation-based application of recommendations for action for critical transitions from steel restraint systems to precast concrete elements in existing buildings with the aim of increasing safety in the event of a vehicle impact.

Lithium-ion batteries (LIB) are regarded as the key technology for battery storage and are finding an ever wider first life application as traction batteries for vehicles. Their continued use in stationary or other mobile applications ("Second Life") is becoming increasingly important for reasons of sustainability, but also for economic considerations: whether in e.g. electrical energy storage systems or in industrial trucks. In addition to many advantages, however, LIB has a not inconsiderable hazard potential (e.g. fire) regardless of the area of application. To ensure the operational safety of LIB over its entire life cycle, however, there is currently a lack of sufficiently detailed understanding and knowledge. This includes the safety-relevant evaluation and qualification, but also the improved early design of automotive LIB (A-LIB) for their reliable use ("First Life"), reuse (especially after an accident) and further use in another application area ("Second Life").

In order to increase the range of electric vehicles, the weight of batteries must be reduced and the available space in the underbody between the subframe and the rear axle must be used in the best possible way. Aluminium as a material for battery housings has a high potential for lightweight construction, but is disadvantageous in terms of fire protection, costs and ecological footprint during production. One approach to reducing the weight, installation space and costs of batteries is functional integration, i.e. that components take over several multiphysical functions: Thermoregulation, vibration damping, impact energy dissipation, fire protection, electromagnetic shielding, ... By combining wood and steel in a battery casing, favourable structural-mechanical and thermal properties of both materials can complement each other and can therefore be exploited. The project Bio!LIB aims to demonstrate that the combination of these materials can provide (1) excellent temperature management, (2) crash performance, (3) vibration damping, (4) thermal propagation containment (at a level of state-of-the-art enclosures and beyond) in combination with (5) low costs and low weight and (6) a small ecological footprint. This is demonstrated by means of a segment (in module or cell stack size) of a battery housing. Aspects of connection, manufacturing technology, increased durability through wood modification, material separation and recycling are also investigated.

BreadCell will develop a sustainable foaming method utilizing non-food wood polysaccharides to produce renewable low density energy-absorbing structural foams with ecological advantage. We propose a radically different platform technology capable of producing high porosity materials from forestbased renewables that cannot be produced by other existing scalable technologies. If successful, BreadCell foams provide a sustainable and ecological alternative to current synthetic foams.

The aim of INTERACT is to improve the effectivity assessment of active pedestrian safety systems, which contributes to the prevention of pedestrian accidents and the reduction of injury severities.