Aktuelle Forschungsprojekte

The recent update to the Euro NCAP Driver Monitoring rating (part of the Safety Assist rating) incentivises manufacturers to use camera-based sensors, to monitor the vehicle interior. While the intent is to identify drivers who are fatigued, distracted or impaired, the sensor information could potentially be used to reduce occupant injury risk in case of a crash. As they provide information in 3D space, 3D cameras are a particularly promising technology in this respect. The present study investigates the potential to use the data provided by these sensors to reduce occupnat injuries in case of a frontal collision.

Numerous measures are being taken to reduce road accidents. The increasing automation of vehicles is expected to lead to a further reduction in road accidents. A so-called "front brake light" could also contribute to this reduction. This brake light is a forward-facing lighting device that lights up at the same time as the rear brake light when the service brake is applied.

Due to the continuous further development of battery cells, it is also necessary to constantly improve the associated housings of batteries and battery modules. and battery modules. In order to continue to guarantee the safety of these battery housings, it is essential to analyse not only the crash behaviour of the battery cells but also that of the protective housing. A key part of this research is characterising the mechanical properties of the materials and the housing itself.

The objective of the study is to evaluate possible effects of the green arrow for cyclists when the signals show red on road safety and to derive recommendations for the practical implementation of the green arrow for cyclists.

The project's aim is to characterise and analyse the mechanical behaviour and safety of next-generation battery cells under realistic confinement conditions.

The project aim is to test battery cells under realistic boundary conditions. This means under conditions that a battery cell also experiences in the battery pack or module. To this end, battery cells are to be tested under preload to analyse how they behave under different types of mechanical load. Furthermore, the results will be compared with those of other cells that differ in geometry and cell chemistry but experience the same boundary conditions and loads.

The aim of this research project is the analysis of simulations with Human Body Models for the pedestrian protection assessment of cars.

The aim of this research project is to analyze simulations that represent the Far Side Occupant Test.

The aim of this research project is to increase safety on the basis of electrochemical impedance spectroscopy for lithium-ion batteries by means of experimental tests.

The aim of this research project is to determine the transferability of the crash behaviour of innovative round cell concepts with regard to different deformations and strain rates.

Within the project requirements for human models are defined and load cases for the comparison of models are developed.

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 generate a new dataset from volunteer tests describing human behavior in braking maneuvers in novel seating positions. This dataset will be used for the calibration or validation of active HBMs. Further, the sensitivity of injury risks in crashes with varying pre-crash postures - as recorded in the volunteer tests for different anthropometries - will be analysed.

Many studies show that there are differences in the risk of injury between male car occupants compared to female occupants. The reasons for this are not fully understood now. The aim of the DIVERSE project is to analyse injury patterns for women and men under comparable boundary conditions and to derive measures for the optimal protection for all. This is done on the one hand by means of detailed reconstructions of real accidents, and on the other hand based on simulations with the latest generation of finite element 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 investigate the behaviour of lithium-ion batteries under mechanical loads. An essential part is the mechanical characterisation of battery cells and battery packs under quasi-static and dynamic loads.

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 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.

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.

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").

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 CD laboratory will focus in the design of high performance alloys by means of thermomechanical processing. These materials are usually exposed to high temperatures and loads at service condi-tions, therefore requiring a tight control of the microstructure in terms of homogeneity, grain size and precipitation state to assure their performance. On the other hand, damage produced during pro-cessing such as pores, cavities, hot tearing, shear bands and cracks, decrease drastically the proper-ties of any final product. The damage conditions must be identified and avoided. Non-ferrous metals for (1) light weight design and (2) high temperature applications will be analized. The main objective of this laboratory is to get a deep understanding and sound descriptions of the microstructure evolution of non-ferrous alloys during thermomechanical processing to design high performance products. To achieve this, experimental, modelling and simulation tools will be required (1) to characterize, describe and model the physical phenomena that take place in metallic materials during their industrial processing as well as at service conditions, and (2) to develop simple physical based multi-scale models that can be generalized for various materials and processes. Additionally, the modification of traditional processing routes will be oriented to reduce the energy involved during metals processing.