For most of us, interaction with a computer means typing on a keyboard and staring at the screen for a response. But to the students in the Department of Computing Science, at the University of Alberta, interaction with computers also includes creating autonomous robots capable of exploring the world for themselves. Welcome to the world of Robotics, an enabling technology of the 21st century much like the microprocessor was to the last century. Robotics is about allowing computers to see their world through sensors and to explore it through mobility and manipulation.
Undergraduate robotics in the Department of Computing Science consists of two project based courses founded by Dr. Hong Zhang, Rod Johnson and myself. Started in 1991, as a curriculum development project, the courses offer a practical hands on approach to designing and building autonomous mobile robots. The students have constructed several small micro-robots that play a game of pinBot in which robots collect points by accomplishing tasks in an eight foot by eight foot robot pinball game. Also constructed was Delphis, a four foot robot submarine or Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) capable of navigating open waters and surfacing to recharge its batteries using an onboard solar cell.
As technology marches forward, robotics will create intelligent machines for jobs too difficult or too hazardous for man to perform. Already local companies have been working with the Vision and Robotics research Lab to create a robot to be used in hazardous low visibility underwater inspection. By making robotics fun, we encourage students to pursue their interests in a technology that may one day affect society in a fundamental way.