By Andy Choi
The University of Southern Indiana takes part in the Lunabotics Mining Competition organised by NASA at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The team consisted of eight members, of which six of them attended the competition. Dr. Glen Kissel, an associate professor of engineering and the faculty advisor for the team, accompanied the team to Florida. The other advisors were Dr. Davis Schultz and Dr. Paul Kuban, who were both associate professors of engineering.
The goal of the competition was to dump 30 kgs of simulated moon soil, which the USI team was able to exceed by dumping 37.6 kg totally. Out of the 60 participating teams only 46 were able to submit the required reports to bring robots to the competition. A final inspection was conducted on the 46 robots, out of which only 36 qualified for participation. The lower cut off amount of moon soil that was to be dumped was 10 kg, which only 13 teams were able to cross. USI stole the 10th position in the competition with 37.6 kg of moon soil dumped. There was a special mention of the USI team’s achievement at the Kennedy Space Center. Last year, USI was able to steal the third spot in the Lunabotics Mining Competition.
Source: http://www.usi.edu/