This project is supported by an individual CUTSD (national teaching and learning) grant.
Computing and engineering education is still very compartmentalised. On the contrary, today's succesfull enterprises thrive on multidisciplinary collaboration. This is most clearly felt in technology intensive engineering enterprises. This project aims at making multidisciplinary, team based problems solving a learning objective in engineering education.
In the last fifteen years the nature of the machines we use for work and leisure has changed dramatically. Digital computers are now part of most machinery, where they help to provide much increased functionality and autonomy without a sharp increase in cost. Mechanical and electronic sensors collect the information that allows digital processors to steer complex operations by means of electro-mechanical actuators. Mechanical, electronic and computer components fuse into one functional entity in cars, trains, air planes, industrial robots, production lines, processing plants and also in disk drives, copiers, printers and domestic appliances.
Mechanical engineers, electronics engineers and information technologists are the main designers, builders and maintainers of machinery and equipment. Across all industries the design, manufacture, configuration, adaptation and maintenance of modern machinery requires the concurrence of knowledge about mechanics, electronics, and computing. Yet, engineering training still remains compartmentalised into the traditional disciplines of mechanical engineering, electrical and electronic engineering, and information technology. As a consequence, mechanical, electronic and information processing components are often developed separately without one part being tuned to the other. The result is a less functional product that takes longer to develop and costs more. top
To overcome this problem a growing number of universities are introducing degree courses in mechatronics. These courses combine an education in mechanics and electronics with some computing. We wish to introduce an alternative that allows the students of each of the traditional engineering disciplines and information technology to gain an appreciation of the other disciplines ideas, concepts and methods, without sacrificing too much of the contents of their main degree course. Students will have the opportunity to improve their of ability for working in teams with members of the other disciplines. top
We propose to achieve this with a series of design and project units that span the entire curriculum. These units require the student to participate in a multidisciplinary R&D team having at least one student from of each of the disciplines of mechanical engineering, electronic engineering and information technology. A student team may have up to six members and will exist over several terms, with new students joining and others retiring from the team. To maintain a high level of motivation in the team members the project has to be carefully chosen to challenge the imagination and skills of their members. The goal of each team is to design, build and operate a set of three autonomous mini-robots capable of playing a game of soccer against the mini-robots of other teams. The robots have to be designed to meet the specifications for participating in international robot soccer championships.
The key element is that the projects will mimic the Research and Development activity in a real technology based enterprise. To maintain a high level of motivation in the team members the project has to be carefully chosen to challenge the imagination and skills of their members. This environment is conducive to acquiring other important but subsidiary skills like project management, communication and finding viable technical solutions while working under resource constraints. Apart from increasing the technical skills of the team members the emphasis will be on interdisciplinary communication and cooperation, team work, and project management. top
Student teams for design and construction competitions have long been popular in engineering education. The one most closely related to our proposal is the widely known Micromouse competition supported worldwide by many universities. What distinguishes our project from other competitions oriented teaching activities like Micromouse is
The project we have chosen is the design and construction of soccer playing mini robots. The QUT Minirobot Soccer Teams will participate in local, regional and international robot soccer championships. Several robot soccer competitions are already held every year.
Mini robot soccer is ideally suited to achieve the objectives. The goal of the project is clear and easy to understand by students at any level. The goal is simply to design, build and operate a team of minirobots that can play (and win) soccer games against other minirobot teams. The goal is achievable. Building a set of robots that can play, autonomously, a realistic game of soccer among themselves, is still beyond the capability of current technology. However by introducing simplifying constraints is is possible to define soccer-like game that is still interesting and suited to low cost robot technology. Teams of small inexpensive robots can be build by students within an acceptable time frame.
Competitions will stimulate the teams. Success in local, regional and international robot soccer championships gives the team members an objective indication of their achievements, however it will only form a minor part of their academic assessment.
The goal requires mechanical, electronic and computing ingenuity. Designing and building a robot soccer team within the given time and resource constraints requires that team members from different specialities and levels of skills work effectively together. The environment of an advanced technical product development is recreated to a high degree of realism with all its competitive market pressures.
The goal is technically challenging to students at all levels. The robot soccer problem contains many subproblems that can be taken to the edge of current research by removing some of the simplifying constraints. Therefore robot soccer can be the source for projects at all levels, from first year to postgraduate.
The goal will retain its technological relevance for many years to come. As technology advances the rules and form of the game will resemble more and more those of a human soccer game. This contrasts with the Micromouse competition. The Micromouse maze traversal problem has reached a state of technical maturity that does not leave much room to either hardware or algorithm development. Winning is now basically a matter of building the fastes Micromouse.
The minirobot soccer is a game that offers most of the technical challenges found in the advanced applications of robots in industrial settings. top
The soccer game offers an artificial world with a richness of situations that comes very close to unstructured environments.
Several robot soccer competitions have been held and more have been announced (check Federation of International Robot-soccer Association ). The two most important regular events are RoboCup and MIROSOT World Soccer Championship. RoboCup is held in conjunction with the yearly Joint International Conference on Artificial Intelligence. The next competition will take place in August 1997 in Nagoya Japan. MIROSOT was initiated in 1996 by KAIST (Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) with significant corporate support. The next competition will be held in in June 1997 inTeijon, Korea.
This competition is restricted to mini robots. The current rules require robot players fit into a cube with edge lengths of 75 mm. The playing area is 1.3 m by 0.9 m. Radio links to the robots are permitted for computer control. Remote control by human operators is forbidden. Each team is allowed to have an overhead video camera to obtain information of the position of the players (robots) and the ball. As can be seen important concessions are still being made to the limits of current technology. The robots are not yet truly autonomous as they are remote controlled by a computer program. top
To observe student progress the student teams will meet fortnightly, with the presence of at least one member of the project team, called the supervisor, present, to report on progress and to present a work plan for the next fortnight. Supervisors will keep logbooks where they record comments on the observed progress of the student team. The student reporting the progress will change from session to session. In this way it will be possible to determine the students ability for using the vocabulary and concepts from all disciplines represented in the team. The logbooks will be revised regularly by the project team, to determine wether special actions have to be taken to achieve the learning objectives.
A public seminar about the state of their work presented at the end of each semester. each team will present a public seminar about the state of their work.
Each student team member will also present a personal report on his contribution to the team. The latter has to be endorsed by the other team members. The personal report will contribute to the evaluation of the design and project unit that student is to be credited with. top