Gustavus Adolphus College

In conjunction with Gustavus Adolphus College’s January Interim Experience, the public is invited to attend a robotics tournament at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 25 in the Wallenburg Auditorium, located in the college’s Nobel Hall of Science.

The tournament is part of a “Robotics Workshop” course taught by Tom Huber, associate professor of physics. During the course, students work in teams to design, build, and program robots. After designing and constructing their robots out of Legos, students make them operable by interfacing sensors and actuators to on-board computers; they then write programs that will control the robots in the upcoming tournament.

During the tournament, students showcase their robots in head-to-head competition. The main event will be a “Lego Sumo Competition,” where paired robots aim to push each other out of a three-foot diameter ring.

The “Robotics Workshop” is part of Gustavus’ January Interim Experience. During the month of January, Gustavus students and faculty take a break from their normal routines to become immersed in the study of one particular subject matter. Differing from the regular semester, classes only last for one month and they generally meet five days a week, three hours a day. The experience is intended to enrich and expand upon the College’s regular semester curricular offerings.