Jeroen De Kooning

Biography

Jeroen De Kooning (1987, Kapellen, Belgium) is assistant professor in sustainable mechatronics at the Faculty of Engineering and Architecture of Ghent University. He received the Master of Science and Ph.D. degrees in electromechanical engineering from Ghent University, Belgium, in 2010 and 2015 respectively. In 2022, he was a visiting professor at the Lappeenranta University of Technology, Finland. His research focus is to make mechatronic systems more sustainable in manufacturing and energy applications. This is achieved by employing the Industry 4.0 concept of Digital Twins, founded upon state of the art techniques in modelling, identification, sensing and control. He is a member of the Dynamical Systems and Control (DySC) research group and the FlandersMake@UGent MIRO core lab within the Motion Products cluster. He is a senior member of the IEEE.

ORCID id: orcid.org/0000-0002-0358-4350
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeroendekooning/
UGent Phone Book: https://telefoonboek.ugent.be/nl/people/802000856262

Research

A major sustainability challenge is to counteract global warming, requiring a significant reduction of humanity’s carbon footprint. This calls for efficient production and use of energy, raw materials, and natural resources in manufacturing, both in the manufactured products and in the production systems. Mechatronic systems are critical components in this energy and material conversion. They are defined as integrated systems containing mechanics, actuation, electronics, control and information technology working together inseparably. The logical future evolution in mechatronics is to exploit the connectivity and computational power of Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) to run advanced simulation models online, exchanging information and data. This gives rise to a virtual counterpart which behaves as the physical asset, also called a Digital Twin (DT). The fact that the DT is connected to the CPS differentiates it fundamentally from a classical simulation model and opens a plethora of possibilities to make the system more sustainable. The long term goal of my research is to leverage the Digital Twin concept to realize sustainable mechatronics. Essentially, a Digital Twin can be used to make mechatronic systems more efficient, productive, long-lasting, reliable, robust and flexible, leading to a more sustainable system overall.

I currently manage a team of 11 PhD researchers, contributing to the above long term research vision. These researchers work on a.o.:

Control: Adaptive (modular) feedback or Model Predictive Control (MPC)
Vision: Capturing process quality, or complex motions in machines
(Online) simulation of dynamic systems, e.g. using co-simulation and multi-body models
(Online) parameter identification

These research topics form the essential puzzle pieces to construct Digital Twins which can close the loop with the physical system. The research is applied and validated experimentally on several mechatronic systems in our laboratories, e.g. web processing machines, pick-and-place systems, robotics, wind energy and hydropower applications. This research is linked to 7 running projects, funded by a.o. Flanders Make, the European Union and VLAIO.

Teaching

Electrical Measurement Techniques
Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering
The course on Electrical Measurement Techniques teaches about the measurement of electrical quantities such as voltage, current, impedance, power and energy. The measurement of rotational speed, position and torque of rotating shafts is discussed as well. Numerous measurement methodologies are presented, of which the accuracy, range, limitations and required signal conditioning are discussed.

Advanced Drives
Master of Science in Industrial Engineering: Machine- and Production Automatisation
The course on Advanced Drives teaches about the operation, modelling, use and control of Permanent Magnet Synchronous Machines (PMSM), switched reluctance machines, stepper motors, linear motors and servo drives.

Digital Twins
Advanced Master 'Smart Operations and Maintenance in Industry'
High computing power at low costs, reliable and high bandwidth sensorisation and communication, and new computational modelling techniques have enabled us to simulate the physical world in a virtual one. It has led to the Digital Twin concept, a virtual replica that acts identically as a physical asset and remains synchronised with the asset during the lifecycle. This opens up a plethora of possibilities, e.g. it can be used to optimise system parameters on the fly, to check the system’s condition live, or to virtually explore future design improvements. Through lectures and illustrative use cases, this course gives students an in-depth view on how to define a Digital Twin, its essential building blocks, and how to validate and use it to create added value in an industrial setting.

Contact

Prof. dr. ir. Jeroen De Kooning
E-mail: jeroen.dekooning (@) ugent.be
Dynamical Systems and Control group (DySC)
Department of Electromechanical, Systems and Metal Engineering
Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Ghent University

Ghent University Campus Kortrijk
Sint-Martens-Latemlaan 2B
8500 Kortrijk, Belgium
T +32 5 624 12 15

Publications

I publish under the name 'Jeroen D. M. De Kooning' (Why?). View my publications in the academic bibliography database of Ghent University or on Google Scholar. If you can't find a copy of one of my publications online, just send me an e-mail and I might even reply!