Technical University of Varna
Description
The Technical University of Varna (TUV) is the second-largest technological University in Bulgaria. With over 5000 undergraduate and graduate students and over 100 Ph.D. students, TUV is of regional and national importance. Historically, TUV is the first Bulgarian University accredited successfully by EUA (The European University Association) and the first implementing the ISO (International Organisation for Standardisation) quality management system. Within the structure of TUV are four Faculties, a Business Park, and a Research Institute. TUV trains engineers for shipbuilding, transport, machinery, electronics, electricity, information, and communications technology. The main educational and research areas of TUV are Information and Communication Technology; Computer Science and Engineering; Mechanical Engineering and Technology; Electrical Engineering, Electronics, and Automation; Power Generation and Transmission; Transport and Marine Sciences; Renewable Energy Sources; Ecology and Technologies for Environmental Protection; Industrial Management, etc.
The TUV Maritime Qualification Center, MQC, https://www.mqc-tu.com/en/, carry out training and research activities oriented towards the design of new ports and facilities, fairways and new VR models, research of ship behavior in narrow channels using advanced 3D visualisations, sailing with disabled vessels, and providing various tests with different ship models.
Role In Project
The TUV's team would contribute to the tasks associated with:
• WP1 Integrating existing infrastructures & digital twins - Integration of the enhanced TUV's models and simulators with the core Iliad platform established in the HPCs nodes.
• WP5 Modelling and coupling with the Iliad observing systems - Elaboration of TUV's sea navigation simulators with weather data for safe ship navigation in the Black Sea, with specific use cases in Varna Bay, Varna Port, and Varna Lake. At this time, TUV's simulators (the 360-degree class-A Full Mission Bridge Simulator (FMBS), 120-degree Class B Simulator, the Multi-Task Bridge Simulator (MTBS) Simulators Class C, Nautical Institute Dynamic Positioning (NIDP) Simulator Class B, and the Rescue Simulator) use more than 200 ship models and over 70 models of ports and stations, among which Varna Port, ports and stations in Burgas, Balchik, Danube river, etc. These can be extended with real-world weather models developed based on the wind, fog, sea waves, and other data collected by partner NIMH.
• WP3 Deployment & integrating citizen science apps - TUV will contribute by recruitment and training of student volunteers for the data collection and data annotation activities to be carried out in Varna in partnership with NIMH. Specifically, TUV will organise short courses to train data acquisition contributors to approach data acquisition. A workshop and seminars will be organised to train a small subset of student volunteers engaged in the data refinement, tagging, and annotation process. TUV will organise public events in order to recruit volunteers for citizen science activities. TUV will support the volunteer community with a purposely-developed mobile app.
• WP7 Platform testing and Societal Engagement – TUV will develop software -- an end-user service for decision making and safe navigation in the Varna Bay and the strait to the Varna Lake. TUV will participate in the Iliad platform testing and, if needed, investigate the contribution of human economic activities to the increase of ecological pressure and stress to the biodiversity decline in the North-Bulgarian offshore of the Black Sea.
• WP10 Capacity Building and Training – TUV will contribute to the training of end-users, the training of Varna Port work-force, and the recruited volunteers for the citizen science activities among the stakeholders. Capacity building and training activities for improving marine-studies-related curricula will be implemented at TUV.
• WP11 Outreach, Communication & Dissemination – TU-Varna will disseminate the project results via peer review publications in high-quality research journals, organise training workshops and seminars, and public events to promote the project results to the general citizen.