HEterogeneous Lightweight materials, accelerated Innovation through a visual COmPuting TRaining network (HELICOPTR)

Heterogeneous lightweight materials, such as fibre-reinforced composites, foams and lightweight metals, offer excellent mechanical properties at low density and large design freedom. They are crucial in achieving sustainability, especially in moving applications such as vehicles, trains and airplanes. The sustainability is derived from the more efficient use of material resources, the lower fuel/energy consumption, lower greenhouse gas emissions, all of which helps to combat climate change. Such lightweight materials often feature complex microstructures. To extend their applicability and optimise their performance, their microstructures need to be well characterised. The exponential rise of visual computing algorithmic and hardware capabilities create a fertile environment for this. Within the HELICOPTR training network, young researchers learn to master the required interdisciplinary skills of materials science and visual computing. Visual computing covers aspects from image processing, visualisation, virtual and augmented reality, machine learning, and human-computer interaction. It generates novel insights and helps to understand, discover, design, and use complex material systems, which sets the basis for material science research. In particular, the novel insights lead to more intelligent and innovative design and production of heterogeneous lightweight materials. Heterogeneous lightweight materials pose significant challenges to visual computing, asking for novel mathematical and algorithmic developments in visual computing, focused on complex phenomena inherent to heterogeneous lightweight materials. HELICOPTR is a crucial training network to advance the implementation of more sustainable and more performant, lightweight materials. HELICOPTR’s collaborative network of academia, material manufacturers and end users is vital in overcoming the challenges ahead in the dedicated research and the valorization as well as the foreseen product improvement.

Keywords:lightweight materials, climate change, Visual computing

Disciplines:Theory and design of materials, Visual computing not elsewhere classified