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A portrait of Dr. Scott Nokleby

Scott Nokleby
PhD

Associate Dean

Department Chair and Professor

Automotive, Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering

Dr. Nokleby's research focuses on the area of robotics, mechatronics, and autonomous systems and seeks to innovate robotic technology to reduce human exposure to hazardous environments. He leads a research program investigating remote-inspection of four-legged robots with OPG and RMUS Canada.

scott.nokleby@ontariotechu.ca
905.721.8668 ext. 5491

Areas of expertise


  • PhD - Mechanical Engineering University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia 2003
  • MASc - Mechanical Engineering University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia 1999
  • BEng - Mechanical Engineering (Co-op Program and Management Option) University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia 1997

MCNP Simulation of Offline Core Dose in CANDU Reactors

Toronto, Ontario December 1, 2015

UNENE Workshop

Designing the Next Generation of CANDU Pressure Tube Inspection Tools

Toronto, Ontario December 1, 2014

UNENE Workshop

Design and Development of a Non-Contact Flaw Replication Tool for CANDU Fuel Channels

Toronto, Ontario June 9, 2013

34th CNS Annual Conference and 37th Annual CNS-CNA Student Conference

Radbot - A Mobile Robotic Platform for Generating Radiation Maps

Toronto, Ontario December 1, 2012

UNENE Workshop

Design and Implementation of an Automated Gamma Probe for Jet Boring Uranium Mining

Published in Journal of Nuclear Engineering and Radiation Science January 11, 2016
Scott Nokleby

A proof-of-concept detector prototype capable of collecting and storing radiometric data in the Jet Boring System (JBS) during pilot hole drilling at the Cigar Lake uranium mine is presented. Cigar Lake is the worlds second highest known grade uranium mine and is located in northern Saskatchewan, Canada. Variant design is used to design, develop, test and implement the detectors firmware, software and hardware.

Indoor Localization of an Omni-Directional Wheeled Mobile Robot

Published in Transactions of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering December 1, 2013
Scott Nokleby

This paper presents a localization system developed for estimating the pose, i.e., position and orientation, of an omni-directional wheeled mobile robot operating in indoor structured environments. The developed system uses a combination of relative and absolute localization methods for pose estimation.

Optimum Design of a Spherical Quasi-Homokinetic Linkage for Motion Transmission Between Orthogonal Axes

Published in Mechanism and Machine Theory January 1, 2013
Danial Alizadeh, Jorge Angeles & ScottNokleby

Homokinetic motion transmission between two shafts with axes intersecting at right angles is a recurrent problem; the term quasi-homokinetic indicates that a constant 1:1 velocity ratio between the input and output is the design target, even though this cannot be fully met with a four-bar linkage. A four-bar spherical linkage is optimally designed, which performs homokinetically with minimum error through a 120簞 rotation of its input link, large enough for one specific robotics application.

Force Optimization of Kinematically-Redundant Planar Parallel Manipulators Following a Desired Trajectory

Published in https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094114X12001206 October 1, 2012
Roger Boudreau & ScottNokleby

In this work, an optimization-based methodology for resolving the generalized forces for kinematically-redundant planar parallel manipulators following a desired trajectory is presented. The proposed methodology assumes that the manipulator is performing a task that is slow enough to allow kinetostatic analysis to be used. Two test trajectories were used to show the effectiveness of the proposed methodology.

Appointed to 2016 Fellow of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering (CSME)

June 30, 2016

Appointed to this role for his significant contributions to advancement in the field.

2014 CSME Best Paper in Transactions of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering

June 1, 2014

Awarded for the 2013 co-authored paper: Indoor Localization of an OmniDirectional Wheeled Mobile Robot, which appeared in the journal's Vol. 37, No. 4, pp. 1043-1056.

Past-President, Durham Outdoors Club

January 1, 2013

Dr. Nokleby served as President from May 2013 to April 2016. The club is run by and for its members who share a common goal of learning about and pursuing a broad range of outdoor activities and experiences.

Associate Editor, Transaction of the CSME

January 1, 2012

Published quarterly by the CSME, this archival journal dedicated is to the broad field of mechanical engineering.

Communications Officer, Executive Committee, Canadian Committee for the Theory of Machines and Mechanisms (CCToMM)

January 1, 2011

The CCToMM is dedicated promoting development in the field of machines and mechanisms by theoretical and experimental research and its applications to practice.

Adjunct Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of New Brunswick

January 1, 2010

Dr. Nokleby serves as a committee member for graduate supervisory students.

Automated Radiation Profiling and Shotcreting of Uranium Mine Drifts

NSERC Collaborative Research and Development Grant with Cameco Corporation January 1, 2015

Dr. Nokleby is the primary investigator in this three-year research project that aims to develop a system to collect better data for uranium mine geologists. ($200,000)

Mining Systems, Automation, and Robotics

Ontario Online Initiative January 1, 2015

Dr. Nokleby co-developed this online course in collaboration with Queen's University available in winter 2016. ($94,500)

Development of New CANDU Fuel Channel Inspection Tools for Increased Inspection Speed

NSERC Collaborative Research and Development Grant with UNENE, OPG, and Cameco Corporation April 1, 2012

During regular maintenance shutdowns in CANDU nuclear power plants, the current system of inspecting fuel channels creates a major bottleneck. As principal investigator of this four-year research project, Dr. Nokleby is developing a robotic inspection system to allow multiple copies to be inserted into the fuel channels at the same time, reducing inspection time and increasing productivity. ($360,000)

Integrated Kinematic Control of Mobile Manipulators

NSERC Discovery Grant April 1, 2016

As principal investigator of this five-year research program, Dr. Nokleby is exploring ways of better controlling mobile manipulator systems using automated arms to improve efficiency and reduce risk in areas such as mining.

Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering

Professional Engineers Ontario

American Society of Mechanical Engineers

Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of British Columbia

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

Engineers Without Borders

  • Introduction to Engineering (ENGR 1015U)
    An introduction to engineering, the profession and core skills of engineers. Topics include: history of engineering; fields in engineering; how systems work; an overview of computer systems; information technology trends and state-of-the-art applications (scientific computing, communications and signal processing); role of engineers in society; core engineering skills including freehand sketching, basic engineering graphics and drafting techniques, engineering report writing and introduction to MAT programming; occupational health and safety, and safety standards.
  • Robotics and Automation (MANE 4280U)
    Industrial robots; robot kinematics, differential kinematics; statics, dynamics and control of robot arms; noncontact and contact sensors; actuators; real-time joint control; task planning and programming of industrial robots; applications of robots.
  • Mobile Robotic Systems (ENGR 5945G)
    This course covers kinematics models and motion control for mobile robots; navigation, including path planning, obstacle avoidance and techniques for decomposition, localization using odometry, map representation, map building and introduction to probabilistic map-based localization; Kalman filter localization and other localization systems; computer vision, including imaging and image representation, feature extraction, pattern recognition, motion from 2D image sequences, image segmentation, sensing and object pose computation, and virtual reality.