Facilities & Equipment
ATIC's physical research infrastructure covers over 2,668 square feet and is equipped with 15 workstations across several on-campus and one off-campus location. Our facilities and equipment support research in UAS-based inspection, hyperspectral sensing, concrete 3D printing, materials testing, and winter roadway condition sensing.
Facilities
ATIC operates research spaces across multiple locations on and off the UND main campus, each tailored to specific research functions.
TTRI Offices - Upson I, Rooms 218 and 220
- 938.9 sq. ft. | Nine workstations
- Houses the Transportation Technology Research Initiative (TTRI) team.
- Primary administrative and research office space supporting NDDOT-sponsored work, the Student Design Center and graduate research activities.
Controlled Cold Room – Upson I, Room 112 Lab Area
- 132.75 sq. ft.
- 0°F average temperature controlled temperature space.
- Used for simulating prolonged exposure to cold conditions, while experimenting with different materials and structural behaviors.
Upson I, Room 106I
- 188.47 sq. ft. | One workstation
- Dedicated hyperspectral imaging (HSI) camera station.
- Houses the PlantSpec 10 HSI Station and associated Resonon cameras for railroad ballast moisture monitoring and surface condition sensing research.
Leonard Hall, Room 318
- 282 sq. ft. | Six workstations
- General research workspace supporting student and graduate researcher activities.
UND Drilling and Completion Lab (DRACOLA) Off-Campus Research Facility
- 1,126 sq. ft. | Two workstations
- 1830 Mill Road, Grand Forks, N.D.
- Off-campus facility housing ATIC’s concrete 3D printing system and MTS hydraulic test machine.
- This is where full-scale culvert construction, structural testing and additive construction research takes place.
- ATIC is among the world’s pioneers in 3D-printed concrete culverts, and this facility enables construction-scale fabrication and load testing.
ATIC Facilities & Equipment
Hyperspectral Imaging System
Combining imagery and spectroscopy, hyperspectral cameras capture light reflectance at thousands of wavelengths, resembled in the camera spectral resolution. The amount of light reflectance changes when material type or state or quality changes. HSI is chiefly developed for biological, earth observation and environmental monitoring applications. Its potential as a noncontact structural condition assessment tool is being investigated by ATIC.
Researchers study the light reflectance and its applications in infrastructure preservation. The technology provides the opportunity to be integrated into Uncrewed Autonomous Systems (UAS).
Near-Infrared (NIR) and Visual Near-Infrared (VNIR) Sensing
- NIR covers wavelengths from 1000nm-1700nm.
- VNIR covers wavelengths from 400nm-1000nm.
Unmanned Aircraft Systems
Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) provide a unique opportunity in the Civil Engineering space. They provide an excellent platform with many capabilities including inspection, monitoring and measurements.
Our Aircraft:
- DJI Inspire 2
- DJI Phantom 4 Pro
- Autel EVO II
- Vision Aerial Vulcan YX
Concrete 3D Printer
Our concrete 3D printer is located at UND’s off-campus research facility. It is a system comprised of several independent mechanical components and software that have been developed and integrated into one cohesive operating unit.
Most other systems come fully integrated with their own robotics, mixers, pumps and operating software, but ours was built from the ground up independently by our talented researchers.
System Mechanical Components
- Colomix Concrete Mortar Mixer
- MAI 2pump LYRA Concrete Mortar Pump
- Kawasaki BX130X Robotic Arm
System Software Components
- AutoCAD
- Rhino
- Grasshopper
- RoboDK
- KRTerm
Composite 3D Printer
Our composite 3D printer is a Stratasys F370. It can print with typical 3DP plastics like ABS and is also capable of printing flexible material like TPU. Models can be created using any CAD or modeling software, so long as the models can be saved as .stl files. The .stl files are then imported into a slicing software called GrabCAD Print. This is where things like fill, orientation and materials are specified for the print.
When everything has been set up, the file (now a .cmb.gz file) can be loaded into the printer and printed! It boasts the following features:
- Build area of 14x10x14 inches (356x254x256mm)
- Two material bays with one model material and one support material slot each
- Touchscreen GUI
The MTS is a hydraulic test stand capable of delivering 20 kips of pressure or tension. It is used to test concrete 3D printed samples.
The optical profilometer is a Keyence VR-6200. It performs non-contact 3D surface measurement using structured light projection, capturing detailed topography and geometry of a sample without touching or damaging it. The system can measure features down to the micron level, making it useful for analyzing surface roughness, wear, deformation and dimensional accuracy on materials like concrete, asphalt, metals and composites. Samples are placed on the stage and scanned in seconds, with the resulting 3D data viewed and analyzed in Keyence’s VR-H1A software. This is where measurements like profile, volume, area and surface roughness parameters are extracted and exported for reporting.
The FRA payload is a specially designed frame containing a NIR HSI camera equipped with a special lens and sensors for operations outdoors to be mounted on either a cart or UAS. It utilizes GPS to georeference the data it collects to ensure pinpoint accuracy for the structures and environments it is scanning.