Research

Flatpack Buildings

Taking apart an entire multi-storey car park in the space of a couple of days and putting it back together again somewhere else without wasting any materials? It may sound like the engineering of a far-away future but it may happen sooner than you think. Recycling materials is common practice nowadays but is it the best solution for the environment? Milan Veljkovic and his team at TU Delft’s faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences knew there had to be another way.

Like sardines in a festival can

How does the crowd at an event move, when do people stop and how do you ensure that safety is not compromised? A large-scale experiment is being conducted at Delft University of Technology to gain a better understanding of the behaviour of pedestrians during busy events.

The North South line shakes up the entire public transport network

Amsterdam’s North South metro line is nearing completion. It is not often that a city’s public transport system is given a structural shake up of this magnitude. Transport & Planning postdoc Ties Brands saw his chance and decided to study the impact of the new line on the surrounding public transport network.

Micro-CT scanner reveals secrets hidden in prehistoric eggs

In 2016 archaeologists digging at a building site in Tilburg stumbled upon thirteen egg-shaped objects. Geoscientist Dominique Ngan put them in the micro-CT scanner of the Geoscience and Engineering Lab, studied the resulting 3D pictures and noticed some very interesting imprints in their shells. ‘A small find like this can shed a lot of light on a period we don’t know very much about.’

BioXtreme is counting on the supercomputer

How do you go about processing an endless amount of data about the DNA material of micro-organisms? When Marjet Oosterkamp was researching industrial wastewater treatment she turned for help to the national supercomputer: it takes over when the human brain and standard computers have to throw in the towel.

The self-reliant irrigation pump: a fine mess

Design and research often focus on how and if something works. Maurits Ertsen prefers to turn the question on its head: why does something not work the way it was meant to? When do people use an invention in an unexpected way? And does it matter? In his latest project, Maurits Ertsen has joined forces with start-up aQysta and colleague Jan Carel Diehl of the TU Delft Industrial Design department to study possible applications of an Integrated Turbine Pump (ITP).

Stories of Science