Research & Academic Work

Unity vs Arkio: Arkio proved more efficient for most visualization workflows, offering faster setup and a more intuitive user experience. However, Unity provided greater flexibility, enabling deeper customization and advanced features required for more complex AR applications.

Cross-Platform AR Deployment: In addition to standalone AR on Meta Quest 3, the team developed mobile versions using Unity, generating APK builds for smartphones and tablets. This allowed testing AR experiences across different hardware constraints and use cases.

Image Recognition (Unity): Unity enabled AR experiences triggered from printed images or predefined markers, using multiple SDK integrations for tracking, anchoring, and interaction.

SDK Integration: A combination of AR/XR SDKs was used to support tracking, rendering, and real-time interaction, requiring careful integration and testing across platforms.

Hardware & Performance Context: Experiments were conducted using Meta Quest 3 and a high-performance PC, while mobile deployments required optimization to balance visual fidelity and real-time responsiveness.

3D Model Visualization: Interactive AR models used for spatial understanding and engineering analysis.

Industrial Validation: Detection of inconsistencies in complex installations (e.g., piping systems), applicable to nuclear, industrial, and civil engineering contexts.

High Polygon Count: Complex models introduced performance bottlenecks and slow loading times.

Rendering Instability: Large meshes caused temporary deformation and visual distortion during initialization.

Performance Trade-offs: Balancing model fidelity and real-time responsiveness was critical for usability.

Pasteurization is a continuous thermal process used to inactivate microorganisms and enzymes in liquid foods, ensuring safety and extending shelf life. This process relies on interconnected heat exchangers for heating, cooling, and heat regeneration.

This research focuses on modeling a three-section plate heat exchanger, tracking temperature evolution along the fluid path and evaluating system behavior during startup and process disturbances.

The system was modeled using energy balance differential equations applied to both fluid channels and exchanger plates, including boundary and initial conditions.

Spatial discretization was performed using finite difference methods, and the resulting system of ODEs was solved using gPROMS.

The model describes heat exchange between fluid and plates at each discretized point, enabling detailed analysis of temperature gradients throughout the system.

The plate heat exchanger consists of multiple channels and plates, allowing efficient heat transfer between fluids in alternating layers.

The interaction between plates and fluid channels is critical to thermal efficiency and was explicitly modeled in the system equations.

A retention tube was included in the model to simulate the required residence time at high temperature for effective microbial inactivation.

Heat loss to the environment was modeled separately, accounting for thermal exchange between the fluid and ambient conditions.

The model was validated using a laboratory-scale pasteurizer (Armfield), processing milk at 72°C. Simulations captured temperature evolution over time, including startup conditions and process deviations.

The results enable:

• Process optimization and control design
• Improved operational scheduling
• Better understanding of transient thermal behavior