
6 September 2018
Luleå Railway Research Center 20 years Jubilee 2018
Luleå Railway Research Cente at Luleå University of Technology is engaged in highly technological research and development focusing on streamlining operation and maintenance of the entire rail system. Thanks to the proximity of both the main line through Upper Norrland and the ore railway, unique research is now being demanded around the world.
"I am a supporter of high-speed trains, and believe that Sweden would benefit from such infrastructure, but the major challenge at the moment is to secure the operation of existing aging infrastructure. We can monitor and maintain by utilizing new technologies such as AI, artificial intelligence, big data and integrating, for example, sensors into our rail system, "says Uday Kumar, Professor of Operation and Maintenance Technology at Luleå University of Technology and Operations Manager at Railway Technology Center.
Investing in high-speed trains is also an investment in technical skills that gave Sweden great success as an export nation. High-speed rail can be a new export success for a country like Sweden, says Uday Kumar.
Luleå Railway Research Center has a number of successful research projects in the luggage after 20 years in the industry.
"We helped in the early stages to develop a new type of trajectory that became a great success. Today, we are working on a series of research projects in something called ePilot, where the goal is to improve punctuality and minimize interference in rail traffic by designing a decision support for maintenance operations", says Uday Kumar.
International Cooperation
Luleå Railway Research Center's ability, research results and knowledge are also being demanded internationally, including Finland, Norway, Iran, India, Great Britain, France, Australia. This spring, a unique project with China South Locomotive and Rolling Stock Industry Corporation, the world's largest rail and high speed rail manufacturer, was launched to develop a high-speed rail maintenance and technology system.
Luleå University of Technology is one of the few universities in the world that today offers education and research in operation and maintenance technology.
"A future dream would be to work with Hyper-Loop technology which is a kind of tube where vacuum can provide fog speeds of over 1000 km per hour. Such projects are already under way in Europe", concludes Uday Kumar.
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