YTU Monthly - May, 2026
Research, Innovation and Campus Life at Yildiz Technical University (YTU)
Featured Research Projects
This edition's featured projects reflect the remarkable breadth of Yildiz Technical University's research engagement — bringing together work that spans environmental education, smart infrastructure, and everything in between. Both projects are internationally funded, underscoring the university's growing presence in the global research landscape: one empowers the next generation to become advocates for water and ocean health across Europe; another reimagines the buildings we inhabit every day, making them more responsive to the people within them. Together, they illustrate a shared commitment to research that is not only scientifically rigorous but meaningfully connected to the challenges of the world we live in.
The SHORE project is an international initiative supported by Horizon Europe that aims to empower students as active agents of change in the field of water and ocean literacy. To date, more than 100 schools across Europe have participated in the project, and over 300 student-centered activities and implementations have been carried out. Through these activities, more than 6,000 students and teachers have been reached directly, while the indirect impact has extended to a much wider audience.
During the project, numerous local environmental projects developed by students have been shared on the SHORE digital platform and disseminated as examples of good practices. In addition, through international events, training sessions, and dissemination activities, a strong collaboration network has been established among stakeholders from different countries.
SHORE has not only raised awareness but also presented a model that encourages young people to develop concrete solutions to environmental challenges, producing measurable outputs and creating a sustainable impact.
While SHORE focuses on empowering individuals through education and community-driven environmental action, the SUSTAIN (Smart Building Sensitive to Daily Sentiment) project shifts the perspective toward technological innovation — exploring how intelligent systems can enhance everyday living environments by responding to human needs. SUSTAIN is funded under the EIC Pathfinder programme — a European Innovation Council initiative designed to support high-risk, potentially transformative early-stage research. EIC Pathfinder projects are notably rare in Türkiye, making SUSTAIN a particularly valuable achievement.
The project’s central proposition challenges a foundational assumption of building automation: that physical sensor data alone is sufficient to optimise indoor environments. SUSTAIN proposes an additional layer of intelligence — one that incorporates anonymised behavioural and sentiment signals drawn from occupant interaction patterns, movement data, and aggregated feedback. Lighting, thermal comfort, ventilation, and shared space management are adjusted not only in response to environmental measurements, but in alignment with the broader wellbeing and satisfaction tendencies of building users.
This approach reframes resilience in critical infrastructure: rather than buildings that are merely robust, SUSTAIN envisions spaces that are adaptive and human-aware — optimising both comfort and efficiency in everyday use as well as during crises.
Rigorous attention to data privacy underpins the entire system architecture. Behavioural inputs are processed exclusively through privacy-preserving computation and anonymisation techniques, ensuring that enhanced responsiveness is achieved without exposure of individual-level data. In doing so, SUSTAIN contributes a replicable model for ethically grounded, human-aware smart infrastructure.
Patents & Technology Transfer
Yildiz Technical University continues to foster innovation and translational research, with its faculty and researchers actively developing patented technologies that address real-world challenges in medicine and beyond.
In some surgical procedures, under the current state of practice, the precise inflation and deflation of delicate tissue is primarily performed manually using a simple syringe. This relies on the operator's skill. In such manual operations, applying high pressure during inflation and negative pressure during deflation can damage the tissue, while inflating at insufficient pressure increases the risk of the surgical procedure not achieving its purpose. The difference between this invention, the "Pressure and Image Feedback Syringe Pump" system, and existing manually operated devices is that it utilizes a servo motor-driven syringe pump with an endoscopy camera and pressure sensor feedback controller structure, enabling precise tissue inflation and deflation. Furthermore, thanks to the pressure sensor and an endoscopy camera, the course of the surgical intervention can be monitored in real-time on the screen, allowing for safer management of the surgical process. This will enable optimal and error-free tissue inflation and deflation before surgery (e.g., in vocal cord surgeries), thus minimizing associated risks in the relevant surgical procedures.
Extending beyond healthcare applications, YTU’s innovation ecosystem also addresses challenges in industrial safety, as demonstrated by the following technology developed within its technopark environment. Metadiag, a technology company operating at YTU Technopark, has developed the patented invention titled “A Safety and Analysis System and Method for Dump Trucks”, introducing an intelligent safety solution designed to reduce rollover risks and improve operational safety in dump truck operations.
The system uses advanced sensor technologies to continuously monitor critical parameters such as tilt angle, vehicle speed, location, load cover status, dump body position, and in-vehicle CANBUS data. By analyzing these inputs in real time, it detects potentially hazardous conditions before they turn into accidents. In critical situations, the system can automatically activate driver warnings and safety interventions, including preventing unsafe dump body lifting, lowering the dump body when risk is detected, and supporting engine protection functions.
With its sensor-based architecture, black box data recording capability, and machine learning–supported analytics, the system not only helps prevent accidents but also provides valuable operational insights for fleet safety, maintenance planning, and performance optimization. Designed for construction, excavation, mining, and heavy-duty field operations, the solution contributes to safer worksites, reduced human-error-related risks, and more reliable fleet operations.
By combining real-time risk detection, automated intervention, and data-driven analysis, Metadiag’s patented dump truck safety system represents an important step toward smarter, safer, and more efficient heavy vehicle operations.
International Events & Conferences
Yildiz Technical University continues to strengthen its position as a leading hub for international scientific exchange, hosting two major conferences this spring that bring together researchers and professionals from around the globe.
The International Conference on Energy Systems (ICES 2026) kicks off on May 3, 2026 at Yildiz Technical University, Istanbul, Türkiye, running through May 6. This international conference brings together researchers, scientists, engineers, and policymakers to exchange ideas and share the latest advances in energy technologies, systems, and applications.
ICES 2026 focuses on a broad spectrum of topics in energy systems, including sustainable and renewable energy technologies, energy conversion, storage, and efficiency, smart and resilient energy infrastructure, and emerging challenges and innovations in energy research.
Selected high-quality papers presented at the conference will be considered for publication in reputable journals such as International Journal of Hydrogen Energy and Energy Storage, following extended peer review.
The university's role as an international scientific venue continues later in the month, as Yildiz Technical University's Davutpaşa Campus welcomes the 7th International Applied Statistics Congress (UYIK-2026, from the Turkish Uygulamalı İstatistik Kongresi), to be held from May 11–13, 2026. Centered around the theme “Reliability and Verifiability in Artificial Intelligence: The Role of Statistics,” the congress aims to explore critical solutions to modern data science challenges through a statistical lens. Organized under the auspices of Tokat Gaziosmanpaşa University in collaboration with TurkStat and the Turkish Statistical Association, this hybrid event will bring together academics, researchers, and industry professionals from across the globe in the historic atmosphere of Istanbul.
Covering a broad spectrum of applied statistics — from data-driven decision-making to the verification of AI algorithms — the congress offers participants the opportunity to keep pace with theoretical innovations and establish interdisciplinary networks. Sessions will be conducted in both English and Turkish. Offering flexibility through both in-person and online participation options, UYIK-2026 invites all stakeholders who wish to shape the future of statistical science and share global developments to join this scientific gathering.
