Tsinghua SIGS: Elevating the “Garden Academy” with Smart Sanitation

The Client

The General Services Office at Tsinghua SIGS manages one of China’s most prestigious research campuses.

Located in the innovative heart of Shenzhen, the campus is designed as a “Garden Academy,” blending high-tech laboratories with lush green spaces. For the management team, the goal is to maintain a pristine environment that supports a peaceful atmosphere for research and learning, without disturbing the thousands of researchers and students living on site.

Challenges

While the campus architecture is futuristic, daily maintenance faces significant operational hurdles. Through onsite discussions with the sanitation team, we identified three core challenges:

Labor Efficiency & Tooling Limits

The sanitation team operates on continuous 8-hour shifts, but the workflow is heavily constrained by traditional methods. A large portion of the shift is spent manually walking to patrol the vast grounds just to check for litter, which is operationally inefficient. Furthermore, during leaf-falling season, the reliance on traditional woven baskets and manual bagging creates a severe bottleneck. The process is physically demanding and slow, making it difficult to keep up with the volume of debris despite the team's hard work.

Strict Acoustic Requirements

As a premier research institution, the campus demands a quiet environment for libraries and laboratories. This rules out the use of efficient but noisy diesel sweepers or gas blowers, forcing the team to rely on slower manual sweeping to avoid disrupting academic activities.

Complex Mixed Traffic

The campus roads are a dynamic mix of pedestrians, shuttle buses, and fast-moving e-bikes (delivery riders). Manual cleaners working in the middle of the roadways face safety risks, requiring a solution that can clean efficiently without blocking traffic or endangering staff.

Solution

Our team deployed the YJ130 to optimize the existing workflow, positioning the robot as a "Smart Partner" for the sanitation crew.

Mechanized

Leaf Collection

Addressing the primary labor bottleneck, the YJ130 acts as a high-capacity mobile collector. High vacuum pressure that inhales heavy piles of leaves directly into its 150L hopper. This replaces the tedious "sweep-scoop-bag" cycle of the woven baskets and allows the staff to manage their 8-hour shifts with significantly less physical strain.

Acoustic Stealth

Utilizing its pure electric powertrain, the YJ130 operates at a whisper-quiet level of under 70 dB. It cleans the library plaza and dormitory pathways early in the morning without waking students or interrupting lectures.

Dynamic

Safety Navigation

The robot’s multi-sensor fusion algorithm was tuned to detect obstacles from 15 meters away. It predicts and reacts to fast-moving scooters and delivery drivers, ensuring smooth navigation on busy campus roads without causing congestion.

Results

The integration of the YJ130 has modernized the campus maintenance strategy.

The robot now handles the repetitive bulk work—especially during leaf season—improving overall cleaning efficiency. This allows the human team to focus on detailed maintenance rather than exhausting manual collection. For now, our YJ130 has served this spot for 558008㎡ in total.

For the General Services Office, this deployment demonstrates a commitment to innovation. It not only solved the efficiency gap but also elevated the campus image, using smart technology to support their workforce and improve the overall academic environment.