Kenyan and Indian researchers have jointly developed one of the world’s most sensitive technologies to detect flaws in buildings, pipelines and railway tracks among other structures.
The technology can help prevent accidents such as the 2011 Sinai slum oil pipeline tragedy that killed 120 people.
It involves the use of a specially amplified ultrasound wave, which can detect even small defects at a length of ten metres.
He said the university team was working in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Technology Madras to improve the existing ultrasound technology.
"This can be used in any buildings, but mostly tall buildings because the risk is higher. It can also be used on rail tracks and oil pipelines and even planes," he said.
The development is published in the reputed peer-reviewed American Institute of Physics Advances Journal.
“With this advance, you can test to see if there's a defect in a structure, after which you do more investigation and rectify the defect,” he said.
The journal paper is co-authored by Prof Gatari, UoN PhD student John Birir and Prof Prabhu Rajagopal of the department of mechanical engineering, IIT Madras.
Using the technology, the team tested an aluminium bar with an induced defect and achieved the highest reported resolution worldwide.
Prof Gatari said UoN's formal collaboration with IIT-Madras began in 2018.
Sharing his experience on the project, Birir, the lead author, said: “My work in the oil and gas industry in Kenya as a certified NDT inspector gave me first-hand experience on the limitations of some of the inspection methods in the market.”
Elaborating on the new method, Prof Rajagopal said in conventional bulk ultrasound-based testing, the sound waves are sent into the sample, say pipe or pillar, and a detector calculates the time interval between the transmission and reception of the sound waves.
Sound waves travel at a uniform speed if the object is defect-free, but defects impede or deflect sound waves, which results in delays in reception.
He said testing must be made at multiple regions of the test material and this is cumbersome on large objects such as train tracks, oil pipelines and tall buildings, among others.
He said the new method improves the existing Guided Wave Testing using what he calls metamaterials to improve the resolution of guided ultrasound waves.
“Metamaterials are artificially crafted materials with unique internal microstructures that give them properties not found in nature,” he said.
The metamaterials amplify the sound wave, making its results comparable to bulk ultrasonic testing with the added advantage of longer range.