Tag: Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University

Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University (SPbPU) has developed a unique learning format within the framework of international educational programs – a Students Project Marathon based on joint students project activities. It is a format of interaction between partner universities, consisting of the development of joint projects by students, postgraduates, and professors.

The Project task meets current scientific and technological topics, is in demand by the industry, and corresponds to the key directions of the world science development. The project results are evaluated by members of the expert commission – professors of both universities, representatives of customers, investors, and external experts.

The first International Students Project Marathon started in 2019, the final forum was held at Polytechnic University, where participants from SPbPU and its strategic partner Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) presented their projects to experts commission. In total, six international teams took part in the innovative international project in 2019. Students, postgraduate students, young scientists, and teachers for many months have been working on serious problems from various research spheres. As one of results of implementation of Students Project Marathon-2019, the scientific group, which implemented a research project in the field of material science, published a number of joint publications, participated in international conferences, and still continuing their joint work in the field of Friction Stir Welding. Several master students from this group became PhD students and now prepare to be supervisors of the new projects next year.

Students Project Marathon continued despite the pandemic and new participants from all over the world joined the Project. In 2020 and 2021 new projects were launched and not only in technical fields (energy technologies, material science, electronics, and telecommunication), but also in the field of Humanities. More partners joined the Students Project Marathon, such as strategic partner of SPbPU, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM, Spain), University of Cadiz (UCA, Spain), and Amity University of Kolkata (India). In 2021 the marathon remains almost the only way to acquire new competencies and international experience.

“We can say that the Students Project Marathon has been ‘put to the test’ by the coronavirus pandemic. We received strong support from our foreign colleagues and partners – universities in Spain, Austria, Brazil, and other countries. The past year has shown that the marathon can adapt to almost any format of interaction without losing effectiveness,” commented Lana Kalikina, coordinator of the Students Project Marathon at SPbPU.

Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University(SPbPU) and the International
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) signed Practical Arrangements on Cooperation in the
Area of Educational Activities in the Area of Emergency Preparedness and
Response – International Master’s Degree Program “Emergency Preparedness
and Response”.

The signing ceremony took place during the 65th IAEA General Conference online. On behalf of SPbPU the ceremony was attended by Professor Dmitry Arseniev, Vice-Rector for International Affairs, Andrey Andreev, Director of the Higher School of Technospheric Safety, Anton Byzov, associate professor at the Higher School, and coordinator of the new Emergency Preparedness and Response program, as well as employees of the international office.

The IAEA was represented by Deputy Director General and Head of the Department of Nuclear Safety and Security, IAEA Ms. Lydie Evrard, Acting Head of the Incident and Emergency Centre, IAEA Mr. Florian Baciu, who also moderated the event, and the Center personnel.

On behalf of the IAEA, the following remarks were made by the Head of the Department of Nuclear Safety and Security, IAEA Ms. Lydie Evrard: “We are embarking on a new collaboration to provide a comprehensive Master’s Degree-level education in nuclear and radiological emergency preparedness and response,” said Ms. Lydie Evrard and highlighted that “such academic programs for the youth help prepare qualified, skilled, and knowledgeable members of the emergency preparedness and response community that are ready to face the realities of a multi-hazard environment”.

In his welcoming remarks from Polytechnic University, Vice-Rector for International Affairs Dmitry Arseniev emphasized that SPbPU has a rich experience in training highly qualified personnel for Russian and foreign companies together with leading organizations, in particular, the State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom.

“And today a new step in our cooperation is taking place – Polytechnic university and the International Atomic Energy Agency are signing an agreement on the implementation of educational activities in the field of emergency response – the international Master’s Degree Program ‘Emergency Preparedness and Response’. We look forward to developing our cooperation and believe that the success of this educational program will contribute to strengthening sustainability and safety in the global world,” said Dmitry Arseniev.

The production of a Master’s Degree Program in emergency preparedness and the response was initiated by the IAEA in 2019 with the involvement of experts of the International Network for Education and Training (iNET-EPR), established by the IAEA.

In 2020, Polytechnic University was chosen as the site for the development and implementation of the new program. In December 2020, the Rector of SPbPU Andrei Rudskoi, Academician RAS, signed a cooperation agreement between Polytechnic University, Rosatom Technical Academy, and Emergency Technical Center of ROSATOM.

The main goal of the new international program is to educate national and foreign specialists in the field of emergency preparedness and response to nuclear emergencies for countries developing nuclear power programs. The program is planned to contribute to the creation of a sustainable nuclear power system worldwide in the near future.

Researchers from Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University (SPbPU) were the first in Russia to develop a friction stir welding technology of a new aluminum alloy for a lightweight pedestrian bridge. The engineers intend to implement an innovative approach at the university: they plan to weld the elements, and then connect them into a bridge at the construction site.

The aluminum pedestrian bridge will be located in the town Bor in the Nizhny Novgorod region (Russian Federation). This will be the tenth aluminum pedestrian bridge in Russia, but the new alloy and friction stir welding technology will be used in bridge construction for the first time. Scientists work in collaboration with the SGR aluminum structures plant in St. Petersburg. The project is supervised by the Aluminum Association of Russia.

In the laboratory of Lightweight Materials and Structures of SPbPU, the engineers will connect about 20 parts of 8 meters long and 16 mm thick made of an aluminum-magnesium alloy. According to scientists, this new alloy has just recently become available for widespread use.

“The bridge is large and has many types of connections,” explained Anton Naumov, associate professor of the Institute of mechanical engineering, materials and transport of SPbPU, adding that the scientific group is developing a technology of friction stir welding for butt joints of aluminum plates on both sides of the plates.

The researcher added that this type of joint will surpass the arc welding in quality.

The scientist also noted it’s more economically profitable to weld a thick aluminum sheets in this way since the arc welding is using a number of additional manipulations (for example, arc welding is carried out in several passes to fill the entire thickness of the seam with the filler wire).

In addition, friction stir welding is a green technology because there is no evaporation of material or luminescence. “The new high-strength aluminum alloys successfully compete with the structural steels in terms of mechanical properties, also, in terms of weight, the aluminum structure will be much lighter than the steel ones. Therefore, the implementation of the aluminum bridges is increasing worldwide,” says Anton Naumov.

The experts of the Laboratory of the Lightweight Materials and Structures SPbPU are developing a welding technology. Then the quality control of the welded joints will be carried out to ensure the safety of the structure.

“Innovative technology of friction stir welding is already used in the bridge construction: the plant “Sespel” uses it for the components of orthotropic plates from the well-known aluminum alloy 6082 T6. But the new bridge will be the first bridge in Russia manufactured using a friction stir welding technology for the new Al-Mg alloy,” mentioned Evgeny Vasiliev, the Head of the transport infrastructure of the Aluminum Association of Russia. According to him, this is a serious task and a real technological breakthrough.

The researchers plan to complete their part of the project by the end of September. The 121-meter length bridge is planned to be commissioned by 2022.

St. Petersburg, like other cities in the Russian Federation, is actively participating in the establishment of the “Smart City” program, which will provide new services for residents of the megalopolis, increasing the safety of citizens. Digital services are essential for such a system.

Due to the Internet of Things (IoT) systems, the environment can adapt to the needs of humanity on its own accord. Cybersecurity threats are especially dangerous for such infrastructure.

Specialists from Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University (SPbPU) developed the methodology for assessing cyber risks in intelligent systems of a Smart City. The developed methodology was tested on the “smart crossroads” test bench (a component of the smart transport system of a Smart City). The results were published in the scientific journal “Machines” of the MDPI Publishing House.

Scientists note that the new goal for cybercriminals is to disrupt the functioning of large enterprises and urban infrastructure, as well as is to intercept the control over them. The attackers using wireless links can remotely invade into the target subnet or device (a group of devices), intercept traffic, launch denial of service attacks, and take control of IoT devices to create botnets.

“Currently, traditional cyber risk analysis strategies can’t be directly applied in the construction and assessment of digital infrastructures in a Smart City, because the new network infrastructure is heterogeneous and dynamic. The goal of our project is to ensure the level of the information assets security considering the specifics of modern cyber threats,” notes researcher Vasily Krundyshev, Institute of Cybersecurity and Data Protection SPbPU.

Researchers of St. Petersburg Polytechnic University developed a methodology for analyzing cybersecurity risks, which includes the stages of identifying asset types, identifying threats, calculating risks, and analyzing the resulting risk values. The proposed methodology is based on a quantitative approach, at the same time it is easily and quickly computable, which is especially important for the functioning of modern dynamic infrastructures. Experimental studies using a set of developed simulation models of typical digital infrastructures of a Smart City (Internet of Things, smart building, smart crossroads) demonstrated the superiority of the approach proposed by the authors over existing analogs.

In the near future, it is planned to arrange the automatic calculation of cybersecurity risks in a Smart City based on the developed methodology.

The reported study was funded by Russian Foundation For Basic Research according to the research project № 19-37-90001.

Researchers of Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University (SPbPU) developed a new approach to determine the best electrode materials composition for Solid-state lithium-ion batteries. The results of the study were published in the first quartile journal Nanomaterials, MDPI. The Russian Science Foundation supports the project.

The development of miniature devices such as sensors and Internet of things (IoT) devices requires establishing small and complex power supplies with a high energy density.

According to experts, traditional technologies for lithium-ion battery production reach their limits. It is difficult to reduce the size and control the shape of the power source any further in the required nano and micron dimensions. Meanwhile, micro and nanoelectronic technologies, such as Atomic Layer Deposition, can assist in producing miniature solid-state lithium-ion batteries with a high specific energy.

Studying the new nanoscale materials for electrodes of lithium-ion batteries, the research group of St. Petersburg Polytechnic University developed a method to determine the electrochemical capacity of each component of the nickel-cobalt oxide system.

Transition metal oxides have a high capacity and relatively low costs, which is required to develop lithium-ion batteries. In the investigation of thin films obtained by atomic layer deposition (ALD) were used as anode materials and demonstrated a high charge capacity at high current densities.

We obtained nickel-cobalt oxide materials in the wide range of compositions from nickel oxide to cobalt oxide and proposed a method to determine the contribution of the capacity of each of the electrochemically active components of the charge/discharge process. This multipurpose technique can be used to determine the best materials’ compositions for lithium-ion batteries notes Dr. Maximov of High School of Materials Physics and Technologies, Institute of Mechanical Engineering, Materials and Transport SPbPU.

In the future, the scientists plan to use their developments to create improved cathodes and solid electrolytes to produce a prototype of thin-film solid-state lithium-ion batteries.