SUTD students showcase designs ‘for a better world’
A scale prototype of the C-Shel, a personal life raft. Photo: Robin Choo
SINGAPORE — A personal protective device that not only helps to keep victims of a maritime disaster afloat but also provide them with basic necessities, such as food and water, until they are rescued is among the projects on display at an exhibition by students of the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD).
Named “C-Shel”, the 1.5m-by-1.5m device, which weighs 1kg, is a barrel-shaped floating shelter and features a waterproof zipper entry and breathable nylon to keep the user warm and prevent hypothermia.
According to the seven-student SUTD team behind the device, during a maritime disaster, the evacuation process on specified decks of the vessel often leads to congestion as everyone rushes to the designated area.
Team member Samuel Low said: “Depending on how bad the overcrowding is during the evacuation, it can take up to hours to evacuate everybody, and congestion will also cause some to go overboard with just life jackets.”
“With this (C-Shel), you can decentralise it (evacuation) on every deck because it is so small, light, and easy to carry, and you don’t need a single deck where everybody converges and overcrowds,” the 21-year-old student added.
The floating device can be deployed within five seconds, and has additional features to facilitate rescue operations, such as having polished amber mirrors to reflect light over long distances to rescuers, and a green led-bulb powered via wave energy conversion for continuous luminescent SOS signals.
Apart from C-Shel, 51 other projects by first-year SUTD students were on display at the exhibition today (Dec 11), which was held at SUTD’s East Coast Campus. The annual showcase, now in its fourth year, features projects aimed at improving people’s lives.
Another team of six students have combined the technology of augmented reality with mobile app and 3D technology to create SMARTag, a device to help users locate their belongings.
The smart tracking device – made of Poly Lactic Acid (PLA) thermoplastic, a type of 3D printing material – weighs around 20 grams and can be customised and attached to almost anything.
The tag, shaped like a square, measures just 2.5 cm in length and is 1 cm thick.
Integrated with the mobile app, it has a system that helps users to keep track of tagged items through their mobile phones with alerts and notifications, and uses augmented reality to search for the items with the phone’s camera function.
Team member Jonathan Ng, 21, said: “It’s something very intuitive, because we are used to searching for items with our eyes. Using the camera function on the app, even as you move the phone around, (the app) shows an arrow pointing down to the highlighted tagged object on your phone.”
“What we are exploring is a proof of concept. Ideally in the future you can get a pack of five (sensors) for two dollars, very, very cheap… (it will) change the way people live. It’s almost like how Google changes the way we search for things (online), we want smart technology to change the way how people interact,” he added.
