Arburg Honouring outstanding achievements

Mid-July saw two graduates bestowed with Arburg awards – for a dissertation and a master's thesis – each for their outstanding scientific research.

In a co-operation with the Technical University of Munich (TUM), Arburg bestows two awards annually for exceptional work, one for dissertation and the other for master's thesis.

Winners of the Arburg awards, presented on the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering Day at TUM, were Dr. Sebastian Kehl for the best dissertation and Agnes Bußmann for the best master's thesis. Presenting the awards were award coordinator Prof. Dr. Birgit Vogel-Heuser, Chair of Automation and Information Systems and Arburg's Apprenticeship Manager, Michael Vieth. “Arburg's goal is to further advance research in plastics or medical technology,” Vieth said and added that is why the company bestows these awards and has presented them since 2016.

In Dr. Kehl's award-winning doctoral thesis titled “Bayesian calibration of non-linear cardiovascular models for predictive simulation of arterial growth”, the mechanical engineer dealt with the development of an approach for parameter calibration of non-linear, computer-aided models of arterial growth. With his mathematical and computational skills, Kehl could overcome existing scientific boundaries. His research, as such, represents an important step towards the predictive simulation of abdominal aortic aneurysms, a potentially fatal cardiovascular disease.

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Best master's thesis went to Agnes Bußmann. In her research work titled “Optimising the bulk composition of a cell-free cartilage replacement material”, the mechanical engineering student pursued the goal of imitating mechanical and frictional properties of articular cartilage by varying the composition of a synthetic and transparent elastomer material. In this complex task, the water-repellent material was made to be able to absorb water to subsequently achieve self-lubricating properties of real cartilage tissue. The mechanical stability of the hybrid material was a factor that had to be considered in the mixture.

Candidates were nominated by professors from the faculties in the fields of plastics technology, medical technology and related scientific fields, from whom a panel of judges comprising four professors of mechanical engineering at the TUM selected the winners.

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