Real open problems, not a marketing brochure.
For academic and industrial research collaborators. We work on the harder questions in pipeline integrity and inspection decision-making - and we have genuine unresolved problems where a research partner could make a real contribution.
Sentrix spans two current application areas - gas pipeline integrity inspection, including City Gas Distribution networks, and refinery/industrial static-equipment inspection - built on one proprietary decision-intelligence software layer. That breadth is deliberate: comparison, prioritisation, and evidence-defensibility are general problems that show up wherever inspection evidence needs to become a decision, and we think the research is stronger for being tested across more than one asset class.
We are not asking for validation of a finished product. The open questions we publish on our approach page are real gaps in our own thinking - how to validate findings against ground truth without a large labelled dataset, what confidence threshold an engineer will actually act on, how change detection holds up across very different asset types. A research partner who disagrees with our framing is exactly who we want to hear from.
What makes a collaboration worth your time
Researchers want problems that are genuinely open, data that is real, and a partner who won’t overclaim. We try to offer all three.
Are the problems genuinely open?
Yes - and we publish them. How to validate inspection findings against real ground truth, what makes an integrity team genuinely trust an automated finding, and what false-positive rate an engineer will actually tolerate are unsolved questions, not solved ones we’re dressing up.
Is there real domain access?
We engage directly with pipeline operators and integrity specialists and have done field work on active sites, which means collaboration can be grounded in real operational context rather than a synthetic benchmark.
Will the work be represented honestly?
We commit to publishing validation outcomes either way and to citing research context accurately - informs-our-approach, not proves-our-product. Your contribution won’t be spun into a performance claim.
Is there a path to impact?
These questions sit on the critical path of a real deployment aimed at a real, large-scale problem - so good answers have somewhere concrete to go.
Does the research generalise beyond gas pipelines?
We think so, and it is part of what we want tested. The same evidence-comparison and prioritisation questions recur on refinery static equipment, and we are genuinely curious - not just optimistic - about how far the underlying approach generalises across asset types.
A decision layer, not another system to adopt
What we can offer a research partner
Published, well-scoped open questions
A concrete set of research questions on our approach page, each framed tightly enough to build a study around.
Grounded operational context
Direct engagement with operators and field sites so the problem framing reflects real integrity workflows.
Honest, citable framing
Accurate use of the literature and a commitment to publishing outcomes, so collaboration builds shared credibility.
A real deployment target
A clear line from research question to operational impact on a gas pipeline integrity problem that plays out on networks worldwide, starting with the markets we work in today.
Have an idea - or a disagreement?
Tell us your institution, area of interest, and the collaboration you have in mind. We especially want to hear from you if you think one of our claims is wrong.