Increased safety in mines

AI is on its way to becoming a tool to improve the overall security of mining environments. Luleå University of Technology’s researchers in robotics and AI have started a new collaboration with the Luleå company ThingWave with the goal of expanding their digitization platform with new AI functions.

Pioneering results

- The collaboration will give us new opportunities to create groundbreaking results in AI and robotics, says Jens Eliasson, CEO and founder of ThingWave.

State-of-the-art sensing solutions

The company ThingWave is focused on production optimization and safety in industrial environments, such as mining, monitoring of critical structures and production chains. The company started in 2016 as a spin-off from Luleå University of Technology, based on more than 15 years of experience of connected built-in units by Jens Eliasson and Pablo Puñal Pereira. Today, they develop and produce state-of-the-art sensing solutions to increase safety in mining operations, among other things, by measuring air quality and smart bolts to detect structural deformation in underground mines. Both measurements are of the outmost importance for the mining industry as a tool for maintaining the safety of the total underground operation and especially after an explosion. However, these sensing solutions are static and are either based on carrying the sensing devices or integrating them into vehicles and other types of machines and the smart bolts have a permanent structural integration.

AI-based navigation of robots

The aim of the work is to create an autonomous data collection from the mining environment by automating the collection of air quality and smart bolt measurements. This will be done through, among other things, robotic sensing of air quality in mining environments and hopes to lead to new methods for AI-based navigation of robots in search of large concentrations of dangerous gases.

Jens Eliasson says:

- We hope to be able to use the expertise available at Luleå University of Technology to expand our digitization platform with new exciting features.

Robots for safety and speed

George Nikolakopoulos, professor in robotics and AI at Luleå University of Technology, concludes:

- The vision for the mining industry is characterized by 100 percent safe operation and reduced operational disruptions. Airborne robots can perform these types of tasks safely, much faster and anywhere in the mine. This can also increase productivity.

The collaboration is part of AIDIHN , Applied Artificial Intelligence Digital Innovation Hub North. AIDIHN is financed by the EU Structural Fund, Luleå University of Technology, Norrbotten Region, Luleå municipality and Skellefteå municipality.