Oregon State University logo

Oregon State University Includes Santos in Graduate Digital Human Modeling Course

/by

Oregon State U ergonomics Following the successful introduction of its first digital human modeling (DHM) course in 2018, Oregon State University (OSU) conducted a successful pilot of a computational ergonomics design course for advanced degrees last year. Now, the School of Mechanical, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering plans to introduce Santos technologies into Digital Human Modeling for Design. The graduate-level course will use Santos’ one-of-a-kind predictive human modeling software in lectures, demos and student homework on ergonomics assessments and biomechanical aspects of concept designs. In addition, researchers plan to apply Santos technologies to human-centered product development research.

“My goal is to integrate Santos into our existing digital prototyping framework and generate preliminary analyses, which will be used as part of our National Science Foundation and Office of Naval Research proposal submissions in 2020,” said Onan Demirel, Assistant Professor in the School of Mechanical, Industrial, and Manufacturing Engineering.

“Having been part of the first DHM course ever offered at OSU in 2018, we are excited this academic partnership continues to grow,” said Steve Beck, President & CEO of SantosHuman Inc. “We can’t wait to see what OSU’s leading academic mechanical engineering design research lab will do with Santos technologies.”

For the courses, Demirel plans to develop undergraduate and graduate curriculum that focuses on DHM as well as computational prototyping, which can bring human factors engineering capabilities early in design.

“Course objectives will target modern product design methodologies with the human-in-the-loop approach. Lecture and homework content will be multi-disciplinary and address theory and practice required for modern product development,” Demirel said. “Santos will help us in understanding, exploring, designing, and analyzing human-product interactions during concept generation and evaluation.”

Demirel is also working on a Design-Test-Build (DTB) facility for computational design which would have Santos available for human performance analysis.

“Santos will provide a platform for analysis of human-product interactions. With Santos in the DTB facility, we will be able to thoroughly explore human-product interactions through DHM as well as motion capture, human-subject data collection, occupational health, ergonomics, human factors, and so on.”

Santos software technologies have been provided to Oregon State University since 2017 as part of the Santos University Program, which includes several academic research partnerships. Those partnerships in Europe and North and South America include Nipissing University, University of Michigan-Dearborn, University of California-Berkeley, Oregon State University, Politecnico di Milano, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, the University of Waterloo and the University of Ontario Institute of Technology.