Researchers at SIT Lab successful participation in the First East Midlands Home Robotics Competition

On Saturday 21st, the first East Midlands Home Robotics Competition at the University of Lincoln, UK, took place and brought together three universities of the regions: Sheffield Hallam University, University of Nottingham, and the host, the University of Lincoln, in a display of innovation and creativity focused on creating robots that would be effective companions in everyday life, in particular, in the context of assistive technology.

The East Midlands Home Robotics Competition aims to become a recurring event in the region inspired in the famous RoboCup event which originated as an incentive to advance the state of robotics playing football, but covers now a variety of challenging tasks focus on many aspects of this field.

In this particular iteration of the event, the SIT Lab from Sheffield Hallam University, participated with a demonstration of a fall-aware robot combining wearable technology, Human Robot Interaction and Navigation. In a home setting, the robot worked as a context aware companion who, in the event of a fall, was able to respond by evaluation the situation and providing immediate help by contacting emergency services if necessary. The team, who included the 5 participants, but combined all members of the lab in the development of the different parts, won this version of the competition against talented team from the University of Lincoln.

The three universities remain committed to make this a recurrent event and a tradition in the regions. On our side, the Lab is already preparing for new competitions as a way of showcasing our research and as an incentive for developing better and more functional assistive robots.