VSTU students took first place at the BIT-Cup 2016 Olympiad, having created the fastest unmanned robot car model.
Oleg Zamzhitsky, Sergey Lanin, and Alexey Danilevsky, participants of the robotics club (led by Konstantin Rineysky), took part in the BIT-Cup Olympiad, which was held for the third time and traditionally gathered talented students from all regions of the Republic of Belarus. The MRobot CodeWheels competition, by the way, was the second most popular (61 people registered). The team leader (or, in other words, coach) Vladimir Leonov, a senior lecturer at the Department of Automation of Technological Processes and Production of the Mechanical Engineering Faculty, accompanied the guys on their triumphant journey.
The high level of the competition is evidenced by the fact that its organizers are the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Belarus and the Belarusian State University of Informatics and Radioelectronics. It was at BSUIR at the end of November that 342 participants of the Olympiad gathered, representing 39 educational institutions of the country. A distinctive feature of the competition is its practical orientation.
The goal of the competition was to write an algorithm and a control program for the robot to complete the track within a specified time. Each team in the final stage was given one MRobot RoboRover M1 robot with all the necessary software to create the program. The technique that completed the largest number of laps on the track in the allotted time won the competition.
To successfully participate in the race, it was necessary to master the C++ programming language, use the Arduino IDE programming environment, understand the principles of operation of optical infrared and ultrasonic distance sensors, microelectromechanical systems accelerometer and gyroscope, and have an idea about the structure of neural networks and building algorithms based on them. Without this, according to the guys, it was impossible to count on victory. It was not easy to compete on equal terms with teams from BSUIR. Nevertheless, in the final, within fifteen minutes
a robot programmed by VSTU students completed 30 laps, outpacing the closest competitor by two.
— We decided to base our algorithm on adaptive movement along the track, — said O. Zamzhitsky, — so that the robot would not drive along the wall, but in the center of the track, overtaking others. This is what helped us, as rivals mainly trained robots individually, and if there were several robots on the track, many had problems: the machine behaved unpredictably if it saw an obstacle in its path.
A few words about the guys. Oleg and Sergey are in their fourth year, Alexey is in his third, mastering, and quite successfully, the specialty "Information Systems and Technologies". In the spring, VSTU students participated in the II Republican Competition WorldSkills Belarus-2016 with a slightly different team (Alexey joined the robotics club recently, before that he was more interested in industrial sensors), and the equipment was not as agile — silver was brought by a prototype of a warehouse robot from the German company Festo weighing 20 kilograms.
By the way, this is an industrial working product, quite expensive, which was purchased three years ago under the former head of the department, Andrey Kuznetsov. In the future, the equipment is planned to be supplemented with a special manipulator, as it must be able to rearrange goods.
Now, however, the "German" will not be so lonely. After all, the winners of the first three places, according to the competition rules, received an MRobot RoboRover M1 robot as a prize. According to Svetlana Klimenkova, Deputy Head of the ATPP Department, such an award was a truly valuable acquisition, and now students have the opportunity to practice the interaction of two robotic systems.
— Today we are training not just software engineers, — emphasized S. Klimenkova, — but specialists with basic knowledge of industrial electronics and microcontroller programming, and in this we are unique. Employers have great plans for the current winners, and we will continue to cooperate with the guys after graduation so that they can share their experience with other students.
As V. Leonov noted, the victory attracted the attention of not only future employers, but also enthusiasts: one first-year student has already applied to join the robotics club and has been given a test assignment.
The head of the ATPP department, Vadim Kazakov, also shared the plans for the club's development: "We are going to purchase four Lego Mind-storms based robots to organize various competitions (e.g., 'sumo', 'races', and the like) and two Festo industrial robots with manipulators, as well as licensed software for them."
Vitaliy SHIENOK. Photos by Oleg KLIMOVICH. "Vitbichi".