Robotics team qualifies for international competition
June 23, 2015
SeaDawgs team members test their robot prior to this week’s competition. (Photo by Megan Bean / © Mississippi State University)
STARKVILLE, Miss. – A group of Mississippi State University electrical and computer engineering students will take the international stage at a marine technical competition.
Originally formed as a senior design team, SeaDawgs Robotics will participate in the Marine Advanced Technology Education Center’s remotely operated vehicle competition in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, June 25-27.
The team includes recent electrical engineering graduates Amelia Hebert and Anna Purser and computer engineering graduates Hunter Rawson and Brad Calhoun.
Each MATE ROV competition is designed to challenge students to apply classroom skills of physics, math, electronics and engineering to solving problems from a marine workplace. This year’s MATE competition focuses on the role ROVs play in polar science and the offshore oil and gas industry.
At the competition, the team must complete three missions set in a mock arctic environment. The first task takes place in an ice tank and includes counting species and sampling organisms, deploying an instrument, and collecting data about an iceberg. The second mission concentrates on replacing a corroded section of oil pipeline and preparing a wellhead for delivery of a Christmas tree while in an offshore engineering basin. The final mission takes place in a flume tank and centers on offshore oilfield production and maintenance. This includes testing the grounding of anodes on the leg of an oil platform, measuring the height of a wellhead, and controlling the flow of oil through a pipeline.
The teams, which include K-12, community college and university groups, choose a category in which to compete: explorer, ranger, navigator or scout. SeaDawgs Robotics will compete in the highest and most challenging class of the competition, the explorer class.
SeaDawgs Robotics is the first ROV group from Mississippi State to enter the MATE competition. Team leader Amelia Hebert said it will be a learning experience for future ROV teams from MSU.
“It’s going to be interesting to see how we rank with those other teams that are a lot larger and spend a lot more money,” Hebert said.
The MATE Center is a partnership of organizations working to improve marine technical education, provide the marine technical workforce with appropriately educated workers, and use marine technology to create interest in and improve STEM education. With headquarters in Monterey, California, the MATE Center has been funded as a National Science Foundation Advanced Technological Education Center of Excellence since 1997.
To learn more about the SeaDawgs, visit www.ece.msstate.edu.
By: Jen Nguyen