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Clothing robots for rescue operations for radiation protection

Date

2017-06-23

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

ORCID

0000-0003-1695-133X

Type

Thesis

Degree Level

Masters

Abstract

Rescue robots are preferred over humans in situations, where human lives can be adversely affected. For instance, in Fukushima nuclear disaster, rescue robots were sent to the irradiated environment of the site to carry out investigations and rescue works. However, rescue robots can also be hurt by the radiations. For instance, electronic components of a rescue robot can malfunction when exposed to radiations, which may hinder rescuing tasks. Therefore, the protection of electronic components in an irradiated environment is the bottleneck problem for such rescue robots to work. The contemporary solution to this problem is to design a specialized rescue robot with a specialized material or coating material to build such robots. Such a solution proved to be ineffective in the Fukushima nuclear disaster management as well as to be costly. This thesis proposes a new concept – namely to wrap a robot with clothes that stop radiations. That is to say, any robot that may certainly not be specifically designed for working in an irradiated environment can clothe itself and then work in an irradiated environment. Feasibility of the concept of clothing a robot along with its technology was investigated in this thesis, and this includes classification of rescue robots in an irradiated environment, development of the architecture of clothes for robots, selection of materials for the clothes for radiation protection. A case study to validate the concept and technology was also conducted. To the best of the author’s knowledge of the available literature, no one in the field of robotics mentioned the concept of clothing robots. The result of the study in this thesis will have a huge benefit to the nuclear energy industry worldwide.

Description

Keywords

Radiation protection, Clothing, Rescue robots

Citation

Degree

Master of Science (M.Sc.)

Department

Mechanical Engineering

Program

Mechanical Engineering

Citation

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DOI

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