Two patents from the Faculty of Civil Engineering impressed at the inventors’ trade fair in Nuremberg: the research team from the Professorship for Building Chemistry and Polymer Materials received a gold medal for its innovative »repair material for the reinforcement of damaged wooden components«. Unlike conventional materials, standard wood-joining materials such as nails and screws can be firmly inserted without any pre-drilling. What’s more, the material has an extremely low density and thermal conductivity, can be shaped into almost any form in its unhardened state, and can also be used vertically and overhead. Allowing the targeted repair of severely damaged but statically relevant wooden components rather than having to replace them entirely as has been customary to date. 

A silver medal was awarded to the research team from the Professorship for Construction Materials for its patent for the »use of tempered hydrotalcite to accelerate the reaction of composite cements containing granulated blast furnace slag«. This innovative approach enables the production of sustainable and at the same time resistant concretes. Adding tempered magnesium aluminium hydroxide carbonate significantly increases the reactivity of cements with a high blast furnace slag content and thus reduces CO2 emissions in the production of binders for the concrete industry.

Efficient visualisation for time-dependent volume data

Prof. Dr. Bernd Fröhlich, Adrian Kreskowski and Carl-Feofan Matthes presented the invention awarded a silver medal developed by the Department of Computer Science entitled »hardware-supported interpolation for the reconstruction of vector-quantized data«. The method is used to effectively compress time-dependent volume data sets and enable their hardware-supported visualisation. Volume data is usually measurement values arranged on a regular grid generated using tomography or microscopy methods, for instance. The invention allows extensive time series of volume data to be compressed so that it can be displayed directly based on the compressed data without the need for any explicit decompression. In contrast to related methods of volume compression, this approach allows the use of hardware-supported interpolation of graphics cards and thus offers a better compromise between smooth display and high visualisation quality for compressed volume data.

Sound expression through weight shifting

A bronze medal was awarded to product designer Eric Geissler whose Bachelor’s dissertation from the summer semester 2018 is primarily aimed at musicians – and, specifically, at anyone who works and experiments with sound. With his »Expression-Pad«, the Weimar graduate has invented a device to control sound effects simply by shifting the weight on one’s feet. The floor pad could thus soon serve as an alternative or replacement to traditional possibilities for expression, such as the foot controllers popular among guitarists used on stage to control their effects. Geissler’s expression pad comes into its own during improvisation, composition and performance and, thanks to its sensitive sensors, allows music makers to use their body to retain full control. Several pads can also be linked together so that multiple control path events can be arranged in a virtual coordinate system and controlled through weight shifting.

2019 Thuringian innovation prizes

The International Trade Fair for Ideas, Inventions and New Products (iENA) has been held in Nuremberg every year since 1948. The Patent Center Thuringia (PATON) presents innovations developed by Thuringia’s universities at the event. In 2019, a total of 15 medals (including 7 gold medals) were awarded to Thuringian innovators and researchers. The Bauhaus-Universität Weimar was honoured with the following awards:

Gold medal
»Reinforcement of damaged wooden components«
German patent: DE 10 2019 128 718, Disciplines: civil engineering, building material science, polymer binders and materials
Inventors: Andrea Osburg (Dr.-Ing.), Torben Wiegand (Dr. rer. Nat.), Franziska Vogt (Dipl.-Ing.), Kay Andre Bode (Dr.-Ing.), Alexander Gypser (Dr.-Ing.)

Silver medal
»Use of tempered hydrotalcite to accelerate the reaction of composite cements containing granulated blast furnace slag«
German patent application: DE 10 2019 214 460, Disciplines: civil engineering, building material science
Inventors: Christiane Rößler (Dr. rer. Nat.), Thomas Sowoidnich (Dr. rer. Nat.), Ole Carstens (MSc)

Silver medal
»Hardware-supported interpolation for the reconstruction of vector-quantized data«
European patent application: PCT/EP2018/070393, Disciplines: media, virtual reality systems
Inventors: Prof. Bernd Fröhlich, Adrian Kreskowski, Carl-Feofan Matthes

Bronze medal
»Expression Pad«
German patent application: DE 10 2019 129 301, Discipline: product design
Inventors: Eric Geißler, Prof. Mühlenberend, Timm Burghardt

Please see our website for more information on the patents held by the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar: www.uni-weimar.de/patente