While developing a breast thermotherapy device to facilitate MR-guided thermo-chemotherapy for the intact breast, it is crucial to ensure effective breast immobilization. It is critical that the device provides consistent positioning throughout the procedure, thereby enabling accurate treatment delivery. In addition, it is equally important that the device provides sufficient comfort to enable patients to endure the procedure.

To quantify these aspects, a design evaluation was conducted (METC approved, N-WMO, MEC-2024-0767). Ten healthy female participants were assessed in the prone position using a clinically established breast MR imaging setup. This provided baseline data and a framework for designing a new breast immobilization method, which was subsequently evaluated using the same approach and healthy volunteers. The breast was submerged in water, and its immobilization (i.e. intra- and inter-positioning displacement) was monitored with Electromagnetic Tracking (EMT) sensors for a duration of 90 minutes. Afterwards, participants were asked to assess comfort in terms of perceived (dis)comfort, local perceived discomfort, local perceived pressure points, and positioning complaints by completing a questionnaire.

Eight out of the 10 participants completed the evaluation for the full treatment duration of 90 minutes on the MR setup. The prone position held with the MR setup was scored with a median discomfort score of 5.0 (IQR 4.0-6.0). The newly developed immobilization method made it feasible for all 10 participants to maintain the prone position for 90 minutes, reporting a median discomfort score of 4.5 (IQR 2.3-5.0). The immobilization results obtained with the new immobilization method showed intra-positioning displacements of the nipple within a margin of 8 mm, whereas intra-positioning displacements of the nipple using the MR imaging platform were recorded within a margin of 9 mm. Inter-positioning displacements of the breast with the new immobilization method were recorded within a margin of 36 mm, while results with the MR setup were recorded within a margin of 51 mm.

Thus, the new immobilization method improved comfort and facilitated that all the volunteers endured the 90 minutes evaluation. However, a reduction in breast displacement was not necessarily observed. Further studies with a larger sample size are needed to support generalizable findings.

Aircraft have been one of the most important means of travel for years. It is known that they produce a considerable amount of emissions. Technological advancements have created enough room for innovation in mobility, including aviation.

Elysian Aircraft is a company with the vision to 'redefine zero-emission air travel,' focusing on medium flights in the category of regional airliners with their upcoming aircraft, the E9X. Additionally, the company aims to redefine the air travel experience as well. This project focuses on the interior design of this aircraft.

In general, comfort in air travel has been an important field that has attracted researchers until now. Over the years, the demand for air travel has increased, with airlines aiming to fit the maximum number of passengers while ensuring some level of comfort. However, whether this is sufficient overall is debatable.

Looking at society as a whole, it has been observed that people miss the sense of carefreeness as a consequence of today’s way of living and distance from nature.

Nature-inspired design can provide psychological benefits, and this was envisioned for the project, starting with the passenger cabin layout. In this concept, passengers can sit in a way similar to their experiences in nature, creating a foundation for the later development of the aircraft interior.

This project explores the prospects for interior design in a dual purpose train that can run both day and night for improved utilization and comfort.

Contemporary trains are categorized as either exclusively for daytime or nighttime use. Their interiors limit them to specific temporal contexts. For instance, in daytime trains, passengers are confined to sitting positions and cannot lie flat, resulting in suboptimal sleeping comfort. Thereby the appeal of such trains for night (long distance) travel is reduced. Conversely, in existing night trains, while passengers can lie flat, the fixed layout featuring compartments and beds makes the capacity of the train too low for daytime use. Moreover, night trains face strong competition from aviation, rendering their utilization challenging.

A solution to this problem involves designing a train interior that serves the dual purpose of accommodating both daytime and nighttime travel. Drawing insights from research, and the existing coach geometry, four distinct design directions were developed. Emphasis was placed on striking a balance between coach capacity and passenger comfort, recognizing the inherent tension between these two factors in this context. One of these directions was further refined into the final concept. In refining the final concept, the emphasis was on creating a passenger experience characterised by privacy, safety and comfort. Two Virtual Reality tests were conducted among other efforts to achieve this goal.

The final concept features a symmetrical coach with a centrally positioned entrance. The entrance aligns with the platform's height, facilitating easy boarding for passengers
with reduced mobility. The central hall houses a self-service bar for acquiring food and beverages. Adjacent to the central hall are seats on both sides. During the day, passengers can occupy these seats, which are configured in sets of two facing each other. No ticket reservation is necessary for daytime travel, and the coach accommodates 72 passengers during this period. Capacity is thereby 10% lower than in daytime-only trains. At night, the seats transform into beds, offering passengers the option to lie flat.
Privacy screens can be easily placed around the bed, and overhead lockers are available for secure luggage storage. The nighttime capacity is 36 passengers, which is the same capacity as the sleeper accommodation in night trains. Ticket reservation is obligatory for overnight travel. The coach incorporates two toilets and two washrooms. Distinct zones within the coach, such as a quiet zone, a socializing zone, and a women only zone for nighttime travel, contribute to a tailored and comfortable passenger experience.

This study investigates the integration of shape memory materials into bolster systems to enhance automotive seating design efficiency. By bridging the gap between morphing materials and seat ergonomics, it proposes a shape memory-based bolster adjustability system. Validation is achieved through the development of a working prototype, offering differentiation opportunities for manufacturers like Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) while improving customer experiences.

With the evolution of Autonomous Vehicles for the near future, BMW has designed a new seat for their vehicles, whose aim is to offer the greatest amount of comfort possible. Their main challenge now is to transform this level of comfort even when passengers want to sleep on the road, or while charging their vehicles. When it comes to confined spaces such as seats, obtaining a comfortable sleep has always been a challenge.

Taking into account the difficulty in achieving comfortable sleep in a seat, one of the main goals of BMW is to further enhance this seat within the context of sleeping. Sleeping is becoming one of the most popular activities among those passengers during a journey, and it is expected to grow with the integration of fully autonomous vehicles. Therefore, the first goal of the project is to analyze the seat to ensure maximum comfort when sleeping, and the second goal is to tackle the main area of discomfort with a design proposal.

For this, a thirty-minute sleeping research is conducted with sixteen participants, evaluating two different backrest angles (120º and 140º). The results show a preference of reclined backrest of 140 degrees, and an increase in comfort compared to sleeping in conventional seats. All participants had a good nap with this reclination, with an average amount of sleep of fourteen minutes. Regarding the seat analysis, the most uncomfortable part of the seat is the headrest, due to the lack of support for neck and head, and the lack of height adaptability to different demographics. The second area of discomfort is the leg support and the lack of footrest.

With these results in mind, the second goal is to develop an attachable head support that can be integrated in the BMW seat, for offering more comfort while sleeping in a reclined position. The main requirement considered is to make it adjustable in the area of head, neck, and height of the user.

The proposed design consists of two main components: a head support and a neck support. An integrated mechanism in the foam allows the adjustment of both to the width of the head and neck. In addition, a mechanism allows adjusting the height of the support to the desired position. Different prototypes are developed to assess the viability of the design features and feasibility for its integration in the seat.

A subsequent user test involving ten participants is conducted to validate the comfort and functionality of the design. The participants were asked to sleep in the seat making use of the new support. In order to obtain more objective results, four pressure sensors are integrated in the product to calculate the ideal pressure distribution exerted by the users. The data obtained from the sensors corroborated findings from literature research. Additionally, the support significantly increases the comfort after a thirty-minute nap in comparison to sleeping without support.

Problem
The automotive industry is undergoing a significant transformation due to technological advancements, especially in self-driving vehicles. This shift presents a unique challenge: designing an interior for autonomous vehicles. The goal of this project is to contribute to the change in the automotive industry by redefining the traditional driver-centric experience into a pleasant journey for passengers. Enhancing the user journey experience during long-term journeys while staying true to the Land Rover brand identity is a key focus.

Goal
The primary objective of this project is to create a human-centred interior concept for fully autonomous vehicles. This concept aims to promote user comfort and well-being during extended journeys. Several sub-goals support this aim. These include forming a vision of future mobility and defining a unique Land Rover user experience. Understanding user expectations for long-term rides and conducting a market analysis to guide the design direction are also important. Ultimately, the goal is to develop a validated concept through user testing.

Analysis
The context analysis utilized a DESTEP framework to explore demographic, economic, social, technological, environmental and political factors shaping the mobility sector. There is an increasing demand for efficient and electric vehicles. This background informs the project its future vision, which predicts a convergence between public vehicles and privately owned cars. The brand analysis of Jaguar Land Rover shows its evolution from utility-focused vehicles to modern luxury offerings. The company emphasises sustainability and user experience. Both, the future vision and brand focus, present new opportunities for design innovation.

Design process
The design direction is based on insights gathered from a context analysis, the Land Rover brand DNA, non-driving-related-taks (NDRT) literature and a concept car market analysis. The focus is on the aesthetic and functional aspects of the autonomous vehicle. This process involved analysing existing (concept) vehicle exteriors and defining key interior functionalities. Concerning the interior, special attention was given to creating an inviting ambiance, particularly in terms of lighting design. This lighting design aims to enhance the overall user experience by supporting the concerning NDRT. The prototyping phase detailed the evolution of both interior and exterior design. Functional elements such as seating, work surfaces, and tailored lighting systems were integrated to meet user needs during long journeys.

Evaluation
User testing was conducted to validate the interior lighting concept and assess its impact on user experience and task performance. Results showed that adequate lighting significantly improved the visibility, comfort and mood while working. The overall pleasantness of the environment also increased. Users preferred well-lit settings and provided specific preferences for lighting configurations that reduce shadows and enhance visibility. Conclusions from the user tests indicated that optimising lighting placement and adjusting light intensity would further enhance the
interior design.

Final design
The design suggests implementing ambient lighting that is placed above and beyond the user. The focus lighting should also be positioned above the passenger but more centred over the seating area. The brilliance layer is mainly integrated into the doors and floor of the vehicle. Additionally, all light layers should have adjustable light characteristics such as intensity and colour.
Finally, various lighting scenarios are shown to demonstrate the importance of flexibility for multifunctionality.

During the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, students are having difficulties with working from home. Particularly those living in a single-room-home, where they have to find ways to separate work and private life, while signals from different activities are mixed in a single room. This thesis focussed on helping TU Delft students quickly, as 82% of the participants in the research of this thesis have a (much) lower satisfaction of working from home, compared to working at the university. And 59% of participants were dealing with a (very) poor ability to separate work and private life. As such, there was a significant need of students to help them through the COVID-19 pandemic. Throughout this thesis, tips and inspiration for home-work environment modifications were gathered and form the main content of this thesis. This content was distributed and evaluated with an iterative approach. With a focus on improving work-related wellbeing by creating the perception of a second room to work from at home. The content can be divided into; physical barrier, visual division, and ergonomic setup. And tackle the different aspects of a second room; creating separation within the room, creating a different vibe to a part of the room, and the setup within the room. This content was implemented in four ways; A booklet, an Instagram campaign, an article in TU Delft Delta, and a website. Combined they reached almost 4.000 views and was considered a success. An Instagram evaluation showed 54% implemented some form of a modification. The modifications were evaluated on the change in satisfaction of working from home, and the ability to separate work from private life. In total, 77% of the participants showed an increase in at least one of the two areas, with 23% experiencing an increase in both areas. This thesis shows the importance of our surrounding environment on our wellbeing, the impact the context in designing for wellbeing, and the impact a design intervention can generate.

The market for shared mobility has seen massive growths in recent years. Pollution and congestion requires us to rethink how we move around and new technologies make sharing continuously easier and more convenient. Society is slowly moving towards a mindset that values access over ownership, and this is also the case for (urban) mobility. Research has shown that convenience is the most important factor for people to engage in shared mobility and the rising demand leads to all kinds of light electric vehicles popping up in our streets. Especially e-bikes gain market quickly, both in the form of publicly shared vehicles as well as within corporate fleets. But with operating shared mobility programs also come challenges, and keeping all those vehicles charged is definitely a major one. Free-floating vehicles are often charged by manually swapping its batteries, while dock-based schemes rely on its users connecting the charger after use of the service. Docking stations for e-bikes exist that combine locking the bike in a physical dock with charging its batteries, but they are often expensive, take up a lot of valuable (public) space and are bike-specific. Next to that, contacts suffer from breaking, mechanical wear and corrosion. The start-up TILER is currently developing a universal wireless charging solution for e-bikes, however the physical form of a charging tile with an accommodating kickstand is not considered as the ideal physical form to apply wireless charging to shared vehicles. Therefore, a graduation project was set up to explore alternative solutions and design a universal and convenient charger for shared electric bicycles. The result of this project is the TILER Click, a product that makes charging an integral part of retrieving and returning shared e-bikes from their hub. The easy alignment in combination with a simple yet efficient clicking mechanism make the TILER Click so simple to connect and disconnect that it is no longer an effort to charge the bike. Placement of the receiver on the rear of the electric bicycle make the product extremely universal and versatile, regardless of bike geometry. The TILER Click offers a convenient, simple and reliable way of keeping e-bike fleets charged. With that, it not only enhances the experience of charging itself, but also has a positive impact on the user experience of the entire system. Being able to charge shared e-bikes in a uniform and simple way can play a crucial role in the future of (shared) mobility.

The Flying-V is a unique concept aircraft to fly more energy efficient. With the V-shape passenger cabin integrated in its wings, a new interior is created with four different seat concepts. This raises the question of how the onboard services could be designed for the Flying-V. As a matter of fact, food plays an influencing role on the overall flight experience. The main objective of this project is to develop a vision for 2050 on the future onboard services and create a concept that delivers an improved food and flight experience to the passenger.

This Graduation product concerning a Master Thesis for the faculty of Industrial Design Engineering explores and develops an Economy Class Sleeping Facility meant for the Flying V concept plane developed by the Delft University of Technology. Sleeping and relaxing are the highest performed activities inside an airplane during cruise flight, however this is scored lowest on comfort. To increase passenger comfort on long-haul flights a better sleeping facility has to be provided by airlines. An extensive literature research along with gathering of relevant information resulted in a list of requirements the Economy Class Sleeping Facility had to fulfill. These requirements together with the knowledge from gathered information were taken into account during the ideation phase. Out of these ideas 2 ideas proved to be possible to turn into a viable product meeting all requirements. These ideas were subsequently turned into concepts by evaluating measurements to check if they were indeed as promising as expected from the ideation phase. A life size prototype was built to make it possible to test both concepts with potential users. This user test performed with 10 participants generated several insights which led to changes to the concepts. Subsequently, concepts were compared and evaluated by using a Harris-Profile to see if they met all requirements formulated from the analysis phase. From this evaluation 1 concept turned out to have the most potential and was chosen to developed into a full design. The final design consists of the Economy Class Sleeping Facility, but also took into account the whole economy class interior it should be placed in. A final evaluation was performed to evaluate the design and form recommendations. This final evaluation is done by an online questionnaire filled in by 204 participants, with 184 relevant responses.
This all resulted in the final design of the Economy Class Sleeping Facility. This Economy Class Sleeping Facility is unique because it offers beds that transform into seats which need to be used during taxi, take-off and landing. This all without occupying extra space, by applying the proposed lay-out capacity of the Flying V even increases with 3 passengers. The beds have a length of 193cm, which means that the majority of people can lay down fully flat while flying. Inside the cabin passengers have their own control panel controlling airflow, lights and the curtains which create privacy. Next to that each bed is equipped with a personal In-Flight Entertainment system. Out of 184 people who evaluated the design, aged between 17 and 75, 69,57% indicated they would use the bed system as presented to sleep during a long-haul flight. Also, participants rated the expected comfort of the beds with an average of 4,45 out of 7. While experienced comfort of sleeping in economy class seats was rated 2,63 out of 7. This shows a large increase in passenger comfort offered by the Economy Class Sleeping Facility.

A LIGHT WEIGHT AND COMFORTABLE AIRCRAFT SEAT.
This assignment started fairly broad with only a clear deadline to present a final prototype at the Aircraft Interiors Expo in Hamburg between 11th and 12th of April 2018. At first the project sounded almost impossible to complete before this time. After discussing the possibilities with Rik Westerink, the starting point was to design an aircraft seat feature for the premium economy class combining manufacturing techniques offered by Aeroworks. This is the reason why the report will start with an initial company and market analysis.

BASED ON ACADEMIC RESEARCH.
Personally I rarely encounter comfort issues on an aircraft. I can sit and sleep comfortably almost anywhere. I guess I am lucky like that. Therefore extensive literature research is conducted to truly understand the elements and developments of comfort and utilize this as an inspirational tool for designing a comfortable aircraft seat for all passengers.

HUMAN, BUSINESS AND TECHNOLOGY.
The project initiated with the company and market analysis, with contributions by literature research on comfort allowed for new ideas to emerge which are processed into an advanced premium economy seat pan concept. By means of prototyping this concept I had the opportunity to conduct user testing at the Aircraft Interiors Expo in Hamburg and share my results for the benefit of improving aircraft seating comfort for a large range of passengers.
Hence, what you may expect from this thesis report is a story about my process from the beginning to the end. The result is a research based design development for a low cost aircraft seat pan concept with comfort features tailored to the economy plus and premium economy class for commercial flights.

To improve the passenger experience at airports, an environment was designed around a relaxing chair. The goal was to create an environment in which passengers feel free to take some time to relax and forget about the aspects that cause them to experience stress or anxiety. The design is created to make the experience of passengers at airports less stressful and therefore more pleasant. This relaxing chair, the VITA Sentation Lounger, is equipped with the innovative Frequency Physio Support (FPS) technology. The FPS technology stimulates blood circulation, reduces muscle tension and with that it reduces anxiety symptoms, stress and the experience of pain (NEWAS,2018). A usability test with the VITA Sentation Lounger at Rotterdam The Hague Airport showed that the chair itself is experienced as very comfortable and relaxing. However, opinions about the FPS technology differ a lot, and passengers can evenly be divided in the following groups: 1. Passengers who prefer the chair without the FPS technology 2. Passengers who prefer the chair with the FPS technology 3. Passengers who don’t prefer one condition over the other. The usability test also showed that besides having a comfortable chair available, a more private area, having some kind of distraction available and being aware of time is very important for passengers to feel comfortable in the run-up to flying. The one thing passengers worry most about is missing their flight. Literature showed that a passenger brings individual perceptions, expectations and experiences into the environment, which all influence the overall comfort experience (Vink, Bazley & Jacobs, 2016). Additionally, being surrounded by greenery in combination with green and blue colours reduces stress levels (Fjeld, 2000), and the presence of lavender scent (Kristidima, Newton & Asimakopoulou, 2010) and relaxing music (Pothoulaki et al. (2008) and Khalfa, Bella, Roy, Peretz & Lupien, 2003) increases the experience of relaxation. Insights from the usability test and literature research resulted in two concept designs, of which one has been chosen to prototype and test in a second usability test. This concept design focusses on distraction and gives passengers the opportunity to forget about negative experiences and to focus on the positive things that come with the travel journey. The seconds usability test was conducted with a prototype of the chosen concept design. The test showed that the designed environment can contribute to a more comfortable and relaxing experience in the run-up to flying and participants mentioned that they would love to use the design at the airport. Main improvements include the possibility to safely store your luggage, the ability to see if the chair is occupied from the outside, and some problems occurred with unclear or even missing information that was given by the interface (control system). These insights lead to the final concept design that is showed in picture 1 and 2. For further research, it is mainly suggested that the final concept design is being tested at an actual airport with a broad group of passengers and some practical considerations need to be taken into account. Besides, it is very important to start convincing airports and airlines about the benefits the design can bring when it’s implemented in their lounges.