Understanding Manufacturing Worker Fatigue and Recovery
Do you want to help make manufacturing work safer?
Project description
Prevention of musculoskeletal disorders requires the design of jobs and work-rest schedules that reduce exposure to risk factors. However, our current understanding and models of fatigue development and the accompanying design of work-rest schedules remain primarily based on static or intermittent static tasks performed to exhaustion. These models do not accurately capture the dynamic nature of work or the potential accumulation of fatigue over multiple fatigue-recovery cycles. The goals of this study are to evaluate, in the context of wiring harness assembly and installation:
1. How does the temporal pattern of fatigue development differ for two work-rest schedules?
2. How do these temporal patterns differ for consecutive days of fatiguing work?
We will develop models to predict fatigue development and recovery that incorporate dynamic task parameters and evaluate these models based on the use of wearable sensors to establish temporal patterns in fatigue development. It is hypothesized that fatigue development will be work-rest schedule dependent and that fatigue and recovery can be modeled based on task parameters. In addition, it is hypothesized that the rate of fatigue will increase over consecutive days of fatiguing work.
Project outcome
Outcomes report submitted to manufacturing company sponsors
Project details
| Length of commitment | About 3-5 months |
| Start time | Summer (May/June) Fall (August/September) |
| In-person, remote, or hybrid? | In-Person Project |
| Level of collaboration | Small group project (2-3 students) |
| Benefits | Academic credit Stipend |
| Who is eligible | All undergraduate students |
Project mentor
Lora Cavuoto
Professor
Industrial and Systems Engineering
Phone: (716) 645-4696
Email: loracavu@buffalo.edu
Start the project
- Email the project mentor using the contact information above to express your interest and get approval to work on the project. (Here are helpful tips on how to contact a project mentor.)
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Preparation activities
Once you begin the digital badge series, you will have access to all the necessary activities and instructions. Your mentor has indicated they would like you to also complete the specific preparation activities below. Please reference this when you get to Step 2 of the Preparation Phase.
- Completion of CITI human subjects protections training
Keywords
Ergonomics, Safety, Industrial and Systems Engineering, Manufacturing, Human Subjects Experiment