Team NCTU attended the DARPA SubT Challenge in Pittsburgh, USA, competing with researchers of top universities around the world. (Picture provided by NCTU)
Team NCTU from National Chiao Tung University (NCTU) heads to Pittsburgh, USA, to attend the DARPA SubT Challenge, held by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency of the United States Department of Defense, competes with researchers in top universities around the world. The competition has three stages in different underground environments: tunnel, underground city, an underground cave. Participants need to use the latest robot technologies to do map construction, automatic navigation, and variation searches in an underground environment. The competition lasts for three years and will award the champion with two million US dollars in the final in 2021.
DARPA SubT Challenge is one of the most significant international competition in the area of technology engineering. For example, the DARPA Urban Challenge in 2007 boosted the development of automated driving technologies nowadays. In May 2019, Team NCTU passed the qualification review of this competition and became the first team in Taiwan that attends the DARPA SubT Challenge, competing with would-top universities and institutions, including ETH Zurich, University of California, Berkeley, CMU, California Institute of Technology, MIT, NASA JPL, KAIST… etc.
According to NCTU, Team NCTU was formed in 2018, which had won fifth place out of fifteen teams in the Maritime RobotX Competition, 2018. In the DARPA SubT Challenge, Team NCTU continues researching AI robot system, including its Autonomy, Perception, Mobility and combines the robotic technologies with the communication industry, such as the funding from Acer Foundation and the collaboration with Smart Frequency Technology Inc. and the National Chung-Shan Institute of Science & Technology (NCSIST). Team NCTU includes the upgraded Super TaiRa long-distance communication by NCSIST into their robots. With the features of Super TaiRa that have a high penetration rate, long-distance communication, and low power consumption, the robots can communication and collaborate underground.
According to the instructor, Hsueh-Cheng, "Nick" Wang, the fourteen team members mainly consists of master students in NCTU. He is proud that the students'' preliminary outcomes can pass the qualification review of DARPA, and they are willing to attend the international competition to challenge the world-top teams. Moreover, a team member says that they will improve the AI robot technology, found a startup team, and chase their dream in the global trend of AI. "Team NCTU attending DARPA competition is already an honor."
Captain Cheng Lung Lu, a second-grade master student in the Institution of Electrical and Control Engineering, believes that Taiwanese students have the same or better ability and perseverance than others. If they are willing to take a step further, they can compete with the world-top teams. Team members usually sacrifice their holidays for more preparation to light up the robotic technologies in Taiwan.
Team NCTU attended the DARPA SubT Challenge in Pittsburgh, USA, competing with researchers of top universities around the world. (Picture provided by NCTU)
Team NCTU attended the DARPA SubT Challenge in Pittsburgh, USA, competing with researchers of top universities around the world. (Picture provided by NCTU)
Team NCTU attended the DARPA SubT Challenge in Pittsburgh, USA, competing with researchers of top universities around the world. (Picture provided by NCTU)
Team NCTU attended the DARPA SubT Challenge in Pittsburgh, USA, competing with researchers of top universities around the world. (Picture provided by NCTU)
Team NCTU attended the DARPA SubT Challenge in Pittsburgh, USA, competing with researchers of top universities around the world. (Picture provided by NCTU)