25 teams prepare for $3.5M DARPA Robotics Challenge Final

2015/03/05 Twenty-five Teams From Around the World to Participate in DARPA Robotics Challenge Finals

$3.5 million in prizes at stake as human-robot teams attempt simulated disaster response 

The international robotics community has turned out in force for the DARPA Robotics Challenge (DRC) Finals, a competition of robots and their human supervisors to be held June 5-6, 2015, at Fairplex in Pomona, Calif., outside of Los Angeles. In the competition, human-robot teams will be tested on capabilities that could enable them to provide assistance in future natural and man-made disasters. Fourteen new teams from Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Japan, the People’s Republic of China, South Korea, and the United States qualified to join 11 previously announced teams. In total, 25 teams will now vie for a chance to win one of three cash prizes totaling $3.5 million at the DRC Finals.

DARPA Robotics Challenge Gears Up For Finale

The latest highlights from DARPA's years-long robotics competition show us just how creative we can be. Here's what you need to know in advance of the grand finale in June.

"The state of the art is not capable of having robots do work on their own in these dangerous environments," said Dr. Gill Pratt, DARPA's defense sciences program manager, in a 2014 press statement. By crowdsourcing this problem to top engineers in academia and the private sector via the DRC, DARPA hopes to eventually rectify this issue.
When the finals are held June 5-6 in Pomona, Calif., 25 DRC teams will showcase their contenders. The DRC finals coincide with the DRC Expo, featuring the latest developments in robotics, unmanned aerial systems, and disaster response technologies.

DRC Finals Home
The DRC is a competition of robot systems and software teams vying to develop robots capable of assisting humans in responding to natural and man-made disasters. It was designed to be extremely difficult. Participating teams, representing some of the most advanced robotics research and development organizations in the world, are collaborating and innovating on a very short timeline to develop the hardware, software, sensors, and human-machine control interfaces that will enable their robots to complete a series of challenge tasks selected by DARPA for their relevance to disaster response.

The MIT DARPA Robotics Challenge Team 

MIT is competing in the DARPA Robotics Challenge with the amazing Atlas robot built by Boston Dynamics. We are developing algorithms and user interfaces to control the robot and to aid a human operator paired with the robot to carry out a series of manipulation and mobility tasks.
The DARPA Robotics Challenge (DRC) is motivated by disasters such as the Fukushima Daiichi hydrogen explosion and the Deepwater Horizon underwater oil spill. The key goal is to develop a dexterous mobile robot that can move through and within disaster zones and perform useful tasks, with minimal guidance from remote human operators remaining safely out of harm’s way.
In competition with 24 other academic and industry teams, we must enable the humanoid robot (supplied by DARPA) to walk over uneven terrain, climb stairs and ladders, enter and drive a small utility vehicle, handle debris and other objects, and use tools. These skills will be tested in a Grand Final in June 2015 for a $2M prize.