By Warren Miller, contributing writer
Large structures such as bridges, ships, airplanes, and buildings need healthcare, too. Structural integrity is the measure of large-structure health and a key element in their overall healthcare plan. Being able to detect wear, unusual stress, or even structural damage early on makes it easier to take preventative measures that can keep the “patient” from needing “surgery.” Until now, it’s been difficult and expensive to install the sensors required to monitor structural integrity in real time and with the accuracy needed to determine a structure’s health.
Recently, a team at Hong Kong Polytechnic University announced the development of sensors using nanocomposite techniques that can be applied via a spray. This technique dramatically lowers the cost of a full sensor network and makes it easy to use on flat or even curved structural surfaces. The sensors create a sensing and communicating mesh that can detect surface imperfections, cracks, and similar defects using ultrasonic sensing techniques.
Some of the obvious applications for such a system are in real-time monitoring of large structures in which safety is critical. Bridges that can report when they are being over-stressed by wind, water current, excessive loads, or even during earthquakes can provide important data for managing and routing traffic. Key structural indicators, measured over time, can help predict when preventative maintenance is needed, avoiding unplanned shut-downs or even structural damage. Similar techniques could be applied to ships, airplanes, train tracks, and even buildings.
Image source: Pixabay.
Perhaps one of the less obvious applications of a pervasive sensing technology is in developing structures that can respond dynamically to stresses and other deviations from normal operation based on the sensor information. For example, a building that can dynamically adjust to the vibrations from an earthquake, perhaps by using damping techniques in the foundation and throughout the building’s internal structure, could be much safer than a static building. The dynamic building could minimize harmonic oscillations that could literally shake a static building apart. Similarly with ships or airplanes, adjustments could be made to the internal structure based on real-time measurements of stress or structural integrity.
In the ultimate application, the sensor nanocomposites themselves could be mechanically responsive, stiffening or flexing as directed by an overall structure controller. If they could be applied as easily as a spray, it would open up entire branches of architecture and design in which structures are implemented as dynamic systems with the equivalent of bones, muscles, nerves, and brains. Definitely a candidate for some serious healthcare.
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