Robomatter, Inc. and the Doolittle Institute Partner to Create the Virtual Mini-Urban Challenge

PITTSBURGH - Dec. 10, 2015 - PRLog -- Robomatter announced a new competition in its Robot Virtual Worlds series, Mini Urban Challenge. This new virtual simulation is based on the national competition sponsored by the Doolittle Institute and the Air Force Research Laboratory. This competition provides an opportunity for students to program a virtual, autonomous robot to navigate through a mini city while obeying all traffic rules and accomplishing specific tasks.

"The virtual Mini-Urban Challenge is great because it enables all students to learn important programming skills, whether or not they have access to a physical robot,” says Jesse Flot, Director of Robomatter’s Robot Virtual Worlds. “With the virtual competition, students have unlimited access to develop and iterate on their code, and try out their own ideas. And, they can compete from anywhere.”

Now in its 8^th season, Mini-Urban Challenge (MUC) is a national high school robotics competition managed and operated by the Doolittle Institute since 2013. This competition is unique because Doolittle Institute supplies, free of charge, the robotics equipment and software necessary for the teams to compete. MUC competitions are conducted in five regions of the United States with the national championship held in Tampa, Florida. In 2015, more than 350 students representing 80 teams participated in the challenge, gaining engineering experience in collaboration, problem solving and team building.

“Robomatter’s virtual world will test and exercise the Mini-Urban Challenge robots. This will greatly expand the number of schools across America touched by our STEM outreach. We are excited about this partnership between Doolittle Institute and Robomatter. The connection of our Mini-Urban “real world” test environment to a bigger simulated world will greatly enrich the experience of the participating students.” Dr. Steve Butler, Director, Doolittle Institute

To learn more about the Virtual Mini Urban Challenge, visit http://robotvirtualworlds.com/mini-urban-challenge/.

About Robomatter

Founded by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA, USA, Robomatter Incorporated uses research-based technology and teaching methods, developed at Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Academy, to provide high-quality, cost-effective K-12 STEM education solutions to classrooms around the world, helping ensure students are ready to compete in a global, emerging economy.

To learn more, visit www.robomatter.com.

About the Doolittle Institute

The Doolittle Institute was incorporated in the state of Florida as a non-profit corporation in July 2012.  Doolittle Institute’s charter is to create an innovative environment for bringing together the best minds of Industry, Academia, and Government to collaborate and find solutions to the toughest Science and Technology challenges while championing science, technology, engineering and mathematics education for all levels of society.

   For more information visit www.doolittleinstitute.org