A robot waiter developed by middle school students under the guidance of Technion researchers won an international competition with the title of "Best Habitual Robot"

The competition was held in the state of Connecticut in the USA, the project was carried out as part of Dan Kuperman's doctoral thesis, who recruited his son Amit to help him

A robot waiter that was developed by the middle school students at Urban C School in Haifa, under the guidance of researchers from the Technion's Department of Technology and Science Education - won the title of "Best Habitual Robot" in an international competition held in Connecticut, USA.

The project was carried out as part of Dan Koperman's doctoral thesis, who recruited his son Amit to help him. Dan began his professional career as an electronics engineer, a graduate of the "Basmat" school. He served five years in the Maram and since then he has been working at the computer company "Mamorex". When he was 33 years old, he began studying at the Technion, in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering. When he presented his final project at the "Medatek" science museum, he met Professor Igor Werner from the Department of Technology and Science Teaching at the Technion. When he saw his strong desire to teach, Professor Werner offered him to come to his department. After two years, Dan began studying for a master's degree in the Department of Technology and Science Teaching. "I did it for the soul and the contribution to the community, not for the livelihood," he says.

His grade average was 97 and therefore he accepted the offer of his supervisor, Professor Werner, to do a doctorate on the subject: "Using robotic models in teaching science and technology". He posed a challenge to his students at the C Benoah Shanan City School in Haifa: "Build a system similar to the one that exists in nature."

"Since 2000, the 'Roboner' competition has been held in Israel - fire brigade robots," says Professor Werner. "The competition is the fruit of the initiative of a former student of mine, today a doctor, Eli Kohlberg. The winners of this competition went to the international competition in Connecticut. Three years ago, a robot-waiter competition was also opened there, where the task is to build a robot that will serve the disabled person in his home, go to the refrigerator, take food and serve it to the disabled person. He must overcome obstacles in his path. So far, cart robots have participated in the competition, that is: robots that roll on wheels. But the user gets a human robot in a better way and that's why we developed a 'human' waiter robot, which is a much harder challenge than a cart robot. The robot developed by Dan, Amit and the students has 18 motors, it is unstable like the cart and difficult to steer, it must maintain its orientation in space in order to walk straight. This is a project for excellent students, a project that brings out the creativity of the student."

When Amit entered the picture, he added to the robot several sensors, a compass and a camera that can recognize colors (the table on which the plate is placed in the competition is marked with red lights).

"Walking in an open area is a complicated challenge, so we added the compass," explains Amit, who worked on the robot with six XNUMXth grade students.

In the competition itself, "Ed" (the robot is called Tecnion Ed, short for Education) encountered several surprises, such as a floor that was painted only two hours before the competition, so it was difficult for him to walk on it, or electromagnetic disturbances that interfered with the compass, so "Ed" walked along the walls.

Professor Werner adds that the theme of emotion stood out in the competition. Viewers loved "Ed" and said he was "cute", something they didn't do when a robot-cart appeared in front of them. When "Ed" dropped the plate he was carrying, there was a big sigh in the crowd.
"Ed, won a special prize - "the best walking robot" and also received a particularly fat "tip" - 1000 dollars.