Chemical Engineering
Digital monitoring of plant heath is essential for fast and accurate detection of plant stress due to water availability, a lack of nutrient uptake, the presence of pests and diseases, among other things.
Self-adhering sensors have the ability to monitor and regulate the internal conditions at an individual plant level and as part of a digitised farming system, can serve to boost yield, quality, and productivity of crops for farmers and the global agriculture industry.
School
Research Area
Responsive hydrogel | Advanced materials | Origami | Sustainable soft robotics
- Research environment
- Expected outcomes
- Supervisory team
- Reference material/links
Key features of the research environment include:
- The work will be undertaken at Fluid Foundry and Complex Fluid Research Group in the School of Chemical Engineering.
- The student will work with the supervisory team: Dr Maryam Hosseini and A/Prof Patrick Spicer.
This project is centred around experimental work, offering students a hands-on experience in sustainable metamaterial design, synthesis, and characterisation, alongside prototyping soft robotics.
The project is grounded in innovative material design concepts using cellulose paper.
Students will have access to a chemical engineering fluid foundry, gaining valuable collaborative skills. The data generated will be used in peer-reviewed publications, and students have the opportunity to further pursue this project as their honours thesis.
- F. Meder, S. Saar, S. Taccola, C. Filippeschi, V. Mattoli, and B. Mazzolai, Advanced Materials Technologies 6, 2001182 (2021).
- I. Fiorello, F. Meder, A. Mondini, E. Sinibaldi, C. Filippeschi, O. Tricinci, and B. Mazzolai, Communications Materials 2,1 (2021).
- B. Chan, N. Balmforth, and A. Hosoi, Physics of fluids 17, 113101 (2005).
- J. H. Lai, J. C. del Alamo, J. Rodríguez-Rodríguez, and J. C. Lasheras, Journal of Experimental Biology 213, 3920 (2010).