A device for monitoring parameters inside the bee hive and a computer-aided electronic aiming system are the distinguished solutions developed by our students as part of the 11th edition of the Team Project Conference. A total of 21 projects were presented in the venue.

The Team Projects Conference is an initiative in which representatives of companies representing various fields and branches of economy propose topics and students carry them out in close cooperation with the companies. As a result, they can see what it's like to work in such enterprises. It is also an opportunity for university employees to make contacts with representatives of the industry, which in the future may result in joint research and development projects..

The topics are proposed in the winter semester and they are later carried out for 15 weeks of the summer semester. They should be consistent with the study programmes, but the emphasis is primarily on teamwork.

This year a total of almost 100 projects were submitted from almost 30 companies. The 21 most worked-out solutions were displayed during the final gala, which this year took place in the A-1 building. The students had to, inter alia, present their idea and demonstrate how it works.

– There are a lot of hardware solutions presented this year and I am very positively surprised by this fact. We must remember that such solutions are much more difficult to implement and I am very glad that students take up such challenges and then devote their time and cooperate successfully with companies – says Dr. Maciej Nikodem from our Faculty, who organises the Team Projects Conference. – The presented projects are also becoming more and more refined and companies often contact us with information that the solutions developed by our students have been implemented and are used on a daily basis – he adds.

Representatives of companies participating in the program indicated best solutions in a vote. The first place went to the „Healthy bee, healthy mee" project, i.e. a device for monitoring parameters inside the bee hive in real time. The web application analyses the collected data and predicts the behaviour of the hive, such as swarming, availability of honey for harvesting or the occurrence of diseases.

The second place went to the project of a computer-aided electronic aiding system. The audience award was given to the „WUST Satellite" project, a miniature satellite equipped, among others, with a long-range antenna system and a photovoltaic panel system.

AI as an aid at the pedestrian crossing

The most interesting solutions included: the project „Calm zebra – intelligent pedestrian crossing" submitted by the company estigiti and implemented by Dawid Szeląg, Łukasz Mędrek, Igor Sosnowicz and Jakub Kalecki from our Faculty.

Our students developed a system that, using a self-trained artificial intelligence model, is able to detect objects in the video image which suggest that a pedestrian may need additional assistance when crossing the road. Currently, the detected elements include crutches, wheelchairs and larger luggage.

– The he biggest challenge was to prepare an appropriate data set. The company suggested to use existing sets rather than to build our own ones, which would be much more time-consuming. The accuracy is not yet perfect, but it is hardly a problem, because it is enough to prepare a larger amount of data and train the model to be much more accurate – explains Łukasz Mędrek.

While working on the project, the students had weekly meetings with company representatives to discuss various problems and concepts related to the developed system.

– At the beginning, I gave them a few ideas, and when it turned out that the whole concept was starting to expand with additional, very complicated elements, I had to tone down the mood a bit and ask them to focus on specific solutions. The students did develop the system, practically by themselves and with great results – emphasizes Michał Rudowicz from estigiti.

Remember about medications

The presented projects included a very interesting intelligent drug inhaler, developed by Łukasz Sokołowski, Aleksander Pajorski, Filip Grzywacz, Filip Górajewski and Miłosz Mikulski, students from our Faculty.

– The project is aimed primarily at older and busy people who do not always remember to take prescribed medications. Our device reminds them of this obligation – explains Filip Grzywacz.

The idea is that the user has an inhaler and uses a mobile phone application to download a drug administration schedule prepared by a doctor. When the time set in the downloaded schedule is close, the device informs about it with light, sound and vibration signals. When the user takes their medication, this information is sent to the cloud where it can be checked by a doctor.

– Our device was created using 3D printing technology and supports the most standard format of drug capsules. We tried to make the interface easy to use and very intuitive, and everything is also described in detail – explains Filip Grzywacz. – As an option, the device can be operated by the patient's guardian or someone from their family, which further facilitates the use of the device.

The project was submitted by Thaumatec Tech Group, which also provided students with a development system on which they could test various solutions.

The main sponsor of the 11th edition of the event was PPG Global Business Services Poland. The gold sponsors were Comarch, Thaumatec Tech Group and Smartbear.

Photos from the 2024 Team Project Conference are available here.