Videos

Wouldn't it be nice if we could use a sponge to suck carbon dioxide out of the air and help stop global warming? That's what Yoran De Vos (VITO) is hoping to achieve. But his sponge is nothing like an ordinary kitchen sponge.

Imagine being sick and simply being able to ask your body what's going on and what it needs to get better. Well, the proteins in our body can tell us that. But it takes a long time for us to understand what they're saying. With his tool, QCquan.net, bioinformatician Joris Van Houtven is determined to speed up that process!

Industrial exoskeletons can support factory and construction workers in their heavy daily tasks and prevent back pain and other work-related injuries. So why exoskeletons not yet widely used in companies? That's what Shirley Elprama (Imec - VUB) is researching: she talks to companies and informs exoskeleton-designers so that they can build better exoskeletons in the future. 

Corrosion of metal structures can lead to disasters, such as the collapse of the Morandi bridge in Genua in 2018. In order to help prevent such tragedies engineer Negin Madelat is working on a method for the early detection of corrosion underneath a thick layer of coating.

Imagine you buy something online and the next day a delivery drone delivers your package at your front door. Robotics engineer Bryan Convens is developing computer algorithms to make this happen. He wants to ensure that swarms of drones can fly autonomously ánd safely through the sky.

The current corona crisis is having a huge impact on our lives. Artificial intelligence can help keep such a pandemic better under control, with less drastic measures and thus a more limited impact on our social lives. Pieter Libin explains how this works in this video.

A dog's nose is one of the most powerful sensors we have. Trained dogs are even able to detect early signs of certain diseases by sniffing our breath. As this would not be very practical, Alex Cruz is looking to integrate a doglike 'nose' in our smartphones to do the trick.

Last year, we all witnessed the horrible fire in the Notre Dame de Paris. While the magnificent stained-glass windows survived the inferno, they suffered damage and need to be repaired. But how can you repair such historic artefacts, of over 900 years old? That's where the 'science of light' comes in, as Mathilde Patin explains in this video.    

Did you know that your smartphone contains, among many other precious metals, about 20 milligrams of gold? That may not seem like much, but it's 200 times as much gold as in a small piece of gold ore. Nick Gys (UAntwerpen - VITO) is working on a technique to easily recycle these precious metals from smartphones.