Sep 14 2010
For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST) has decided to involve 171,000 children of age group 9 to 14 in “Body Forward”, an international robotic challenge program organized by FIRST LEGO League (FLL).
It helps the children from more than 50 countries to experience the advancements made in the Biomedical Engineering field. It was announced that the student teams will also be provided with an opportunity to take part in the FIRST LEGO League World Festival, which is to be held at the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, from April 27 to 30 2011. This year’s Junior FIRST LEGO League will also feature more than 10000 students of ages 6 to 9.
Each FLL Challenge has two parts – the Robot Game and the Project phase. Students require research to conclude the project and science and engineering to accomplish the intricate tasks of the robot game phase. Teams will be provided with certain recent medical tasks like bone revamping, pace makers, quick blood screening and also futuristic medical aspects like bionic vision, controlling an object using thought, nerve mapping etc. Student teams are supposed to build and program robots using LEGO MINDSTORMS technology to achieve the desired tasks proposed by the Challenge. In the second round of the Project phase, teams explore any part of a body or any of its utility and will elucidate various means of protecting or enhancing it. Later they will share their ideas with the people.
Dean Kamen, Founder of FIRST, has stated that for the past eleven years their FIRST LEGO League Challenge has enabled the students to understand how innovation and imagination coupled with scientific technology has deciphered real world issues. He also added that they expect the latest generation of developers to work on modern medicine to guarantee future improvements in the health care services. He expressed that imparting Biomedical Engineering to these budding scientists can introduce them to an exhilarating field which has a huge potential.
Source: http:// www.FIRSTLEGOLeague.org