【Inspired Research - Smarter Firefighting Saves Lives】
Fires in densely-populated urban Hong Kong often place firefighters in unpredictable perils. To safeguard their lives, Edward Lowe from West Island School developed an AI robot prototype capable of detecting and combating fires under the guidance of researchers from
#PolyU’s Department of Building Environment and Energy Engineering.
“The robot identifies and attempts to put out a fire by generating high-speed vortex, without the use of extinguishing agents. This effectively reduces fire damage and casualties.” Edward did face challenges as the only mentee in the project. “Flames are dynamic objects but detection delays mean AI sometimes lags behind changes in the fire scene. My mentors were really supportive, and their knowledge and experience played a big part in overcoming these obstacles.”
PolyU’s Junior Researcher Mentoring Programme enables senior secondary students to gain holistic hands-on experience on the research process across different topics. With about 18% of mentees so far going on to study at PolyU, the programme hopes to nurture more research talent going forward.
More:
polyu.hk/hJWaO
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The research project “Smart Firefighting with AI and Robots” is led by Dr Xinyan HUANG, Associate Professor of the Department of Building Environment and Energy Engineering, as well as team members Mr Meng WANG and Mr Wilson CHEUNG, PhD students of the same department.
#PolyUResearch #Researchmentoring #JuniorResearcher #ResearchforImpact #AI #SmartFireFighting #robotics