|
Taiwan Wins Big in International Robot Olympiad
|
Source: Epoch Times
|
2007.11.19
|
|
Hong-Wen Chen (Second from the right), Jing-Hao Fan (Third from the right), Shuo-An Hsu (Second from the left) from the elementary school group and their instructor, Mr. Hsin-Sheng You (Left) are presented with an award for their work “Turtle” that won second place in the International Robot Olympiad 2007. //CNA
|
170 student delegations from 18 countries around the world participated in the International Robot Olympiad 2007 (WRO), setting a record high number of participants. After two days’ heated competition at the National Taiwan University Athletic Stadium starting on the 17th, teams from Taiwan stood out and won the top four awards in the Elementary School Group, the top three awards in the Junior High School Group, 2nd place in the Senior High School Group in competition and 3rd place in the Elementary School, Junior High School, and Senior High School Groups in creativity, respectively.
This year’s WRO was divided into two categories, competition, and creativity, and for each category there were elementary, junior high school, and senior high school groups.
Who Runs Fastest?
The topic this year was “Robot Mt. Ali Race”, through which international contestants got to know the special features of Taiwan’s railways. Robots assembled by the contestants had to mimic the movement pattern of the Mt. Ali Train; that is, they had to walk on a difficult terrain and back forward at turns only.
Team Sonic from Taiwan won the first place in the Elementary School Group. Pin-Hao Lai, a 6th grade member from the team of Lan-Ya Elementary School, Taipei City indicated that he started playing Lego blocks since he was in kindergarten and learned programming and sensor design for designing dynamic blocks toys during the 2nd grade. He said that to participate in this tracking competition, he installed 4 sensors on the robot so that the robot would keep moving forward in the other direction when bumping into a barrier and complete the journey.
Shi-Gang Chen from the Mechanics Society of Wan-Fang Senior High School, whose “Firefighter” won the 3rd place in Creativity in the senior high school group, indicated that the design of the “Firefighter” encompassed the tower ladder with a safety net and the air mattress surrounded by rails and could catch people trapped in high floors safely to shorten the rescue time.
Robots are Moving Toys
Chang-Ze Han, Director of the Information Management Office of the Department of Education, Taipei City Government, indicated that participating robots were fully automatic and their movement was controlled by light, temperature, vibration, or voice. Robots are moving toys that combine structure, dynamics, programming design and assembly creativity, which can be promoted and encouraged in as early as the elementary education.
Han-Pang Huang, Director of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Taiwan University, indicated that Japan has been known for its advancement in the R&D technology of robots. However, this year Pohang University of Science and Technology in Korea invested more than US$40 million in building the Pohang Robot Center to pave the way for and impress the world in the next WRO to be held in Korea.
Machine Dog by the Hong Kong Delegation, First Place in Creativity in the Elementary School Group of the International Robot Olympiad 2007 // The Central News Agency
|
