Camera-Aided Technology For Underground Mine Safety
- Principal Investigator (PI): Nathalie Risso, PhD, Mining and Geological Engineering (MGE)
- Co-Principal Investigator: Angelina Anani, PhD, MGE; Hee-jeong Kim, PhD, Department of Civil and Architectural Engineering and Mechanics
- Research Assistant: Carlos Olmos de Aguilera
In this collaborative project, researchers at the Mine Automation & Autonomous Systems Laboratory sought to develop a system for automatic PPE detection for industrial and underground mining environments.
The project, “Camera Aided Technology for Underground Mine Safety” or CAT-UMS, utilized a regular camera and Machine Learning to detect if a person is wearing a hardhat. Progress to date includes an initial labeled dataset of 1,000 images, software for helmet detection, and successful mobile demos of the system with accompanying articles. Ongoing work includes installation of cameras and IR illumination for testing at our student-run San Xavier mine.