| Hendrik Van Brussel | |
| Birth Date: | 1944 |
| Birth Place: | Ypres |
| Nationality: | Belgian |
| Fields: | Robotics |
| Alma Mater: | KU Leuven |
| Known For: | Mechatronics Robotics Manufacturing |
Hendrik (Rik) Van Brussel (24 October 1944, Ypres, Belgium) is a Belgian emeritus professor of mechanical engineering of the KU Leuven, world-renowned for his research on robotics, mechatronics and holonic manufacturing systems.
Van Brussel received the degrees of technical engineer in mechanical engineering (B.Sc.), in 1965 from HTI, Ostend, Belgium; of ‘civil engineer’ in electronic engineering (M.Sc.) in 1968 from KU Leuven, Belgium and of Doctor of Applied Sciences (Ph.D.) in 1971, also from KU Leuven, thesis: "Dynamical analysis of the cutting process". In his whole career, spanning a period of more than 40 years, he has been active in the intersection zone between several disciplines: mechanical engineering, electronics and control engineering, information technology; a domain which is now called "mechatronics".
He started his career as Expert at the Metal Industries Development Centre (MIDC), Bandung, Indonesia, where he also occupied the post of associate professor at Institut Teknologi Bandung, Bandung, Indonesia (1971—1973). Thereafter he returned to the K.U.Leuven to pursue an academic career, becoming full professor in 1980. He was Head of Division PMA (Production Engineering, Machine design and Automation) of KU Leuven, (1980–93 and 2001–03) and subsequently chairman thereof (2003–2010). He was Chairman of the Department of Mechanical Engineering (1993–2001). He was Project leader of Interuniversity Attraction Pole Projects on Advanced Mechatronic Systems (Centre of Excellence), from 1987 until 2006.
Apart from his extensive work in Cutting dynamics, Structural dynamics, Computer-Integrated Manufacture (CIM), and Micro and Precision Engineering, the rest of Van Brussel’s work may be organized under the following three main topics:
Robotics: Pioneering work in robotics research in Belgium, and in Europe; work includes: active force feedback; methodology for model-based task-specification and control of "compliant motion" tasks; universal three-finger gripper; LOLA, an off-line robot programming language with structured data base; KARMEN, a general analysis and design program for the inverse and direct kinematics and dynamics of 3D mechanisms; multi-component force-torque sensors and a tactile sensor array; robotic force-controlled deburring; Service robotics: LiAS, an autonomous mobile manipulator; intelligent wheelchairs with shared autonomy; medical robotics, e.g. robotised laparoscopy involving innovative haptic interfaces.
Mechatronics: Development of a mechatronic design philosophy, aiming at the ‘mechatronic compiler’ where the mechanical structure and the motion controller are simultaneously optimised, for designing high-performance machines and machine systems. This includes: optimisation of the mechanical structure in the conceptual design phase; derivation of robust control algorithms (H-infinity, sliding mode, ..) that can guarantee performance in the presence of important disturbances, such as changing machine configuration, cutting forces, friction, …; derivation of simple control models from finite-element models of the mechanical structure as a basis for developing control algorithms; development of an integrated design framework for simultaneous optimisation of structure and controller of complex flexible-multi-body mechatronic systems with time-varying configurations.
Holonic Manufacturing Systems (Multi-agent systems): In the framework of the factory-of-the-future idea and along the lines of the Intelligent Manufacturing System (IMS) programme, launched in 1990 by Prof. H. Yoshikawa, Japan. Main achievement is setting up reference architectures and a design methodology for holonic manufacturing systems. The developed PROSA architecture is generally accepted by the international research community as a reference architecture. Application of biologically inspired control paradigms, like pheromones in ant colonies, to control complex manufacturing systems, which leads to a multi-agent control framework.
Amongst the many awards and honours Prof. Van Brussel has received, here is a list of the more prominent ones:
A full list of publications of Hendrik Van Brussel, including the over 80 (co)supervised PhD theses, is to be found on K.U.Leuven's publication repository. Here are a few selected papers: