Bram Demeulenaere

Postdoctoral Fellow of the Research Foundation–Flanders
(FWO-Vlaanderen)

Mechanical Engineering Department (PMA)
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
(home university 2004–2010)

Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing (IWR)
University of Heidelberg, Germany
(visiting scholar 2007–2008)

Contact

Celestijnenlaan 300B–Bus 2420, 3001 Heverlee, Belgium
Tel: (++32) 16 32 2487 or (++32) 16 32 2480
Fax: (++32) 16 32 2987
bram.demeulenaere@mech.kuleuven.be
http://people.mech.kuleuven.be/~bdemeule

Current research

While the essence of the mechatronic design paradigm is to create better products through integration of mechanical, electrical and software design, the essence of my research is to create superior products through mechatronic programming, of which convex optimization theory constitutes the cornerstone.

This design approach has allowed us to determine limits of performance in the following application domains of mechatronics:

counterweight balancing [1], [2]
dynamically optimal motion trajectories for cam and servo systems [3]
time-optimal and time-energy-optimal path planning for industrial robots [4]
repetitive control of periodic systems [5]

As a spin-off also perhaps the ultimate mechatronic system has been studied, that is, the human body. In this domain, it has been shown that convex optimization techniques may yield significantly better (faster and more accurate) estimates of the muscle forces that correspond to some experimentally observed human motion [6].

News

Projects

A new K.U.Leuven IDO (Interdisciplinair Onderzoek–Interdisciplinary Research) project has been granted (EUR 500,000; 3yr) to a consortium consisting of the following K.U.Leuven divisions: Division Bewegingscontrole en Neuroplasticiteit (Dr. Jonkers, Prof. Duysens), Division PMA (ir. De Groote, Dr. Demeulenaere, Prof. De Schutter) and Division PSI (ir. Scheys, Prof. Suetens). This project is entitled Modeling human motion from a neuromechanical perspective: from a generic mechanical model towards a subject-specific cybernetic system.

Open positions

We have several open positions for Ph.D. students wanting to work on applications of convex optimization and optimal control in mechatronics and biomechanics. For the above mentioned IDO project, a Ph.D. student is sought wanting to work on neurophysiological aspects of human motion.

Cam design software

pyKurv, our stand-alone Python software for cam design is now in beta-release and being tested by one of our industrial partners.

Conferences

I’m attending the following upcoming conferences:

Int. Conf. on Noise and Vibration Engineering (ISMA2008), September 15–17, Leuven, Belgium
VDI Getriebetagung, September 23–24, Fulda, Germany