American University of Sharjah issued the following announcement on May 10.
Mechanical engineering students from American University of Sharjah (AUS) won second place in the sixth edition of the Undergraduate Student Research Competition held at Abu Dhabi University (ADU), Khalifa City Campus, on April 30. The annual competition is the largest gathering of undergraduate student researchers in the country and promotes scientific research among undergraduate students.
”Create. Innovate. Inspire” was the competition’s theme this year, with more than 250 research papers submitted and evaluated by a committee comprising professors and field experts from various academic institutions of higher education. The papers spanned a variety of subjects from the fields of arts and social sciences, to education, engineering and business administration to name a few.
The winning team from AUS consisted of Majed AlMarzooki, Noora AlZaabi, Badireh Hozhabr, Muhammad Sohaib Nasir and Sultan Al-Qassimi, with their project entitled “Design, Implementation, and Performance Analysis of Bio-inspired Micro Air Vehicle.”
The project focused on the design, implementation and testing of a bio-inspired flapping wing micro air vehicle. A clap-and-peel mechanism was mimicked from insects to enable higher aerodynamic power generation compared to conventional flapping methods. Such flying systems can be deployed for the inspection of confined spaces, detection, and tracking of small and hidden mobile objects.
The project was advised by Dr. Mehdi Ghommem, Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering, who said:
“I am really proud of the great achievement of my students who were fully dedicated to the research idea and managed to design and build a miniature flying vehicle, weighing about 15 grams, equipped with flexible wings and carefully-selected tiny components including a two-stage reduction gear system, a Li-Po battery, a brushed DC motor, main receiver, and FPV camera. A flight test was successfully performed indoor to demonstrate the flying capabilities of the air vehicle and the camera showed a clear visual inspection of the area.”
The AUS team was awarded AED 2,500 and given certificates of appreciation.
Original source: https://www.aus.edu/media/news/aus-students-win-second-place-at-6th-undergraduate-research-competition
