Mulch Ignition by Firebrand vs Irradiation
April 2025
Mulch products are important landscaping materials at the wildland-urban interface, which may pose a significant ignition risk to adjacent structures. In this study, we evaluated how different mulch types respond to firebrand piles and radiant heat—two critical ignition pathways in WUI fire scenarios. Our findings highlight the varying ignition susceptibilities among common landscaping mulches in California, providing valuable insights for homeowners, landscapers, and fire safety professionals aiming to enhance fire resilience in vulnerable communities.This work is led by Shaorun in collaboration with Prof. Michael Gollner from UC Berkeley and now published in Fire Safety Journal.
Space Fire Extinguisher Got Geneva Gold+ Award
April 2025
The PolyU Fire team led by WANG Meng and QUAN Sainan won the Gold Medal with Congratulations of the Jury in the 50th International Invention Exhibition in Geneva. The proposed project is “Smart Fire Extinguisher for Spacecraft”, which applies the air vortex rings to attach the flame in spacecrafts, without the use of water or any other chemical extinguisher. Big Congratulations!
AIoT Predicts Burning Fuel and Smoke Hazards
April 2025
Most smart fire forecast system can only predict the temperature field with heat sensor. Our latest work applies AI and three sensors of temperature, smoke density and CO concentration to predict the overall fire smoke hazards and the type of burning fuel in the confined building environment and use corridor as an example. This work is led by Wilson Cheung and in collaboration with Prof. Wojciech Wȩgrzyński from Building Research Institute (ITB) of Poland and is now published in Indoor and Built Environment.
200+ Abstracts Received in ISLBFS 2025
April 2025
By the extended deadline of abstract submission (5 April), the symposium has received over 200 submissions. The full paper will be due on 15 July. Then, the program committee will review the papers and decide oral and poster presentations. The conference also calls for working-in-progress posters (WIPP) and sponsorships from Industries. See more details of Diamond, Golder and Sliver sponsorships in the following link.
Pre-Ignition Wood Deformation and Rupture
March 2025
Mass timber construction has been emerging in architecture. Our latest work quantifies the deformation, critical shear stress of rupture, and degradation mass losses of the heated wood before ignition. With both experiments and numerical simulations, our findings support the early warning for ignition and collapse, fire resilience design, and structural-fire stability assessment for wooden structures. This work, led by Supan and Yanhui, is now published in Case Studies in Construction Materials.
Xinyan Received the IAWF Early Career Award
April 2025
Xinyan received the 2025 Early Career Award in Fire Science from the International Association of Wildland Fire (IAWF). The Early Career Award is to recognize a promising early-career professional who has demonstrated outstanding ability in any field of wildland fire science and under 40 years of age. Previous winners include Prof. Guillermo Rein (2015), Dr Sara McAllister (2019), Prof. Michael Gollner (2023). Xinyan is the first awardee from Asia. Congratulations!
Xinyan Visits ITB Poland
March 2025
With the invitation of Prof. Wojciech Węgrzyński, Xinyan visit the Building Research Institute (ITB) of Poland, as their first visiting professor. Wilson also finished his 6-month attachment in ITB, where he completes a critical part of PhD thesis research. Wilson and Xinyan also attended the Poland annual Fire Symposium in Zakopane and gave keynote presentations on smart firefighting and fire smoke visibility.
Smart Evacuation by Tracking Multi-cameras
March 2025
Real-time crowd data from surveillance devices is essential for the emergency decision-making and management inside complex buildings. We propose a novel real-time multi-camera tracking framework for the detection, tracking and re-identification (Re-ID) of evacuees across multi-camera. This multi-camera tracking framework helps develop a more automated monitoring system and an intelligent digital twin for building emergency safety management. This work, led by Yifei and Xinghao, is now published in Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence.
Group visit to China Guardian Art show
March 2025
PolyU Fire Group organized the annual spring trip to see the China Guardian Art Show in HK Convention Centre. To improve the taste of student paper writing and promote work-life balance, visiting the art show becomes a group traditional event.
Automatic Fire-Fuel Load Assessment by CV
March 2025
We introduce an intelligent method to automatically assess indoor fuel load and fire safety by leveraging a digitized fuel load database and computer vision. Then, a fire risk heatmap will be auto-generated to visualize the spatial distribution of high-load fuels and potential fire spread hazards. The application of this AI tool supports smart firefighting and emergency response. This work is led by Yifei in collaboration with Prof. Negar Elhami-Khorasani from University at Buffalo and Prof. Thomas Gernay from Johns Hopkins University, now published Process Safety and Environmental Protection.
Welcome Visiting Scholar Prof. Liqun Chen
March 2025
Prof. Liqun Chen from Shenzhen Technology University, China will spend 6 months in PolyU Fire Group as a visiting scholar. Prof. Chen received his PhD from City University of Hong Kong in 2021. His current research interests include intelligent modelling and fault diagnosis of distributed parameter systems applied to Li-ion batteries. He also gave a seminar on Distributed Thermal Fault Diagnosis of Large-format Lithium-ion Batteries to the department. A warm welcome!
Fire Drill in PolyU Support Evacuation Research
February 2025
Our latest study examines a fire drill in a multi-functional university building at PolyU with over 800 participants. We found that nearly 50% of participants delayed responding to fire alarms, with some remaining in their rooms for over four minutes. Exits experienced imbalanced utilization rates, and one was over 200% of design capacity, revealing occupants' preference for familiar routes. This study, led by Yuxin Zhang in collaboration with Jülich Research Centre, Germeny, is now Open Access in Developments in the Built Environment.
Prof. Pello from UC Berkeley visited PolyU
Feb 2025
Prof. Carlos Fernendez-Pello, a distinguished professor from University of California visited PolyU Fire Lab and gave a seminar "Wildland fire ignition and initial development” to PolyU. Carlos’ research, funded by agencies such as NASA, NSF, and DARPA, emphasizes material flammability, wildland fire, and combustion processes. He was also Xinyan’s postdoc supervisor, and this was his third time to visit PolyU.
Modeling Battery Fire at Low Ambient Pressure
Feb 2025
The storage and transportation of Li-ion batteries under low pressure have critical safety concerns. We simulate the battery thermal runaway at different sub-atmospheric pressures. This model improves our understanding of battery fire under low pressures and provide novel insights for ensuring battery safety in storage and transportation. This work, led by Yanhui in collaboration with Prof. Greg Offer and Dr Huizhi Wang from Imperial College London, is now Open Access in Journal of Power Sources.
HK Hill Fire Site Group Visit
Jan 2025
A severe wildfire occurred in Hong Kong in 7th January. PolyU fire team went to the fire scene and evaluated its impacts and destruction. We found that lots of trees and grasses were burnt out, but some new grasses just several days after the fires. More importantly, Hong Kong is a typical wildland-urban interface (WUI), meaning that wildfires may severely impact the urban or cities if they cannot be well prevented and suppressed. More research is needed here.