Siemens Excellence Award: 10,000 Swiss francs for "SBB Thermo-Scanner" from the Bern University of Applied Sciences
Siemens has honored two young researchers from the Bern University of Applied Sciences with the national Siemens Excellence Award. The prize, worth 10,000 Swiss francs, goes to Sebastian Häni from Zurich and Raphael Laubscher from Bern. With their work "SBB Thermo-Scanner: Detecting thermal problems on rolling stock", the computer science graduates convinced the expert jury and prevailed against four other nominated teams.
As part of the "SBB Thermo-Scanner" bachelor thesis for their computer science degree at the Bern University of Applied Sciences (BFH), the young researchers designed a thermo-scanner for the SBB. The energy required for heating passenger compartments accounts for a large proportion of the energy consumed by SBB passenger transport, which is why intact insulation is crucial for an optimal energy balance. The scanner used by the two BFH graduates produces automated thermographic images of entire carriages as they pass selected locations.
predictive maintenance
A thermal imaging camera reveals heat losses and defective insulation. The data is then rectified and processed. This is possible for the first time thanks to the hardware and software developed by Häni and Laubscher. This makes it possible to determine the optimum time for maintenance even before insulation problems occur. This type of intelligent maintenance, also known as "predictive maintenance", enables cost- and energy-efficient operation. With their work, the two diploma students convinced the jury as well as SBB as the client. The decisive factor for the award was the solid engineering work of the two computer scientists in terms of planning and solution finding and the perfectly functioning hardware for the thermal imaging camera.
For Matthias Rebellius, CEO of Siemens Switzerland, the promotion of young talent takes an important position: "With the Excellence Award, we want to motivate young people to work on scientific topics that can be implemented in practice." In addition to scientific achievement, the degree of innovation, social relevance and practical feasibility of the work are the main factors that count in the evaluation of the work. The Excellence Award is part of the "Generation21" education program, with which Siemens seeks dialog with the next generation and promotes young talent in the fields of science and technology.
"With this commitment, we accompany young people in their development and in their training and support them in taking advantage of their future opportunities," says Matthias Rebellius. (Source: siemens)
