Integration of optical sensors into smart composites and advances instruments.

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This two year project aims at integrating Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) sensors into smart composites and instruments used in aerospace technology and material synthesis, to monitor their structural health integrity and thicknesses during their operation. The main research activities are related to the development of protective coatings, self-healing materials and high-sensitive devices, whose damaging due to wear, ageing effects and high velocity collisions with space debris and reactive plasmas will be investigated. Several optical sensors that are able to provide a self-diagnostic of their structural integrity in real-time will be designed and tested, in close collaboration with MPB Technology Inc., a company that develops highly resistant compact systems and smart FBG sensors for aerospace industry, and Plasmionique Inc., a company specialized in the design of plasma chambers and advanced instruments employed in advanced materials synthesis. Our objectives are triple: (i) help our industrial partners improve and optimize both the quality and the reliability of their products, (ii) implement experimental benches and platforms to perform reliable and reproducible tests, (iii) develop innovative components and smart instruments for structural-health monitoring. Our research will be conducted in the Montréal Area, where all experiments and advanced characterizations will be carried out. To achieve our goals, which include the conception of several prototypes, we plan to recruit one PhD student and one postdoctoral fellow (PDF), who will be assisted by one Research Associate during the whole duration of the project. The expected impacts will result in advancing knowledge regarding smart materials and FBG sensors, as well as in their implementation into protective coatings and monitoring systems.