[attach id=642559 size="medium" align="right"]The robotic arm extending from a train inspection monorail, equipped with the camera used to capture images of the tunnel wall. [/attach]

University of Malta Master’s student Leanne Attard recently deve­loped an automatic inspection system using computer vision to detect changes on tunnel wall linings. The project was the fruit of a 12-month research project for the award of a Masters of Science in Communications and Computer Engineering at the University’s Faculty of ICT.

The research involved an investigation to choose the most suitable photographic equipment to be placed on a moving robotic framework as well as the actual programming for the image processing. Part of the project involved a six-month on-site placement at the engineering department of CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, in Switzerland.

The research was partly funded through the Endeavour Scholarship Scheme.

Attard is now studying for her PhD in a similar collaboration between the University of Malta and CERN. She is currently at CERN using the inspection system she developed during the master’s as a proof concept, and improving and extending the system using different and new image processing techniques and algorithms.

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