Need to solve a Rubik’s Cube? There’s a bot for that

Final year Engineering students will be showcasing their skill and stellar cutting-edge technological projects during two large expos at McMaster this Friday.

The student displays will feature 48 projects ranging from a voice-activated robotic arm to a concussion diagnosis app to a WiFi connected vehicle charger.

The popular annual Electrical & Computer Engineering technological showcase and competition (ECE Expo) is joined this year by the department of Engineering Physics. Both capstone showcases run from 9 to 4 p.m. on Friday April 8.

ECE will be in CIBC Hall, McMaster University Student Centre (Third Floor) and Engineering Physics will be in the Marketplace (First Floor).

For participating final-year engineering students, the expos represents the culmination of a year’s work and a chance to demonstrate both theoretical and applied skills. Each team was required to identify a complex engineering problem and then work as a research and development unit to solve it.

Trevor Pogue, a fourth year electrical engineering student, created a robot to solve a randomly scrambled Rubik’s Cube within 20 moves for his final year project.

“Rather than get really fast at solving a Rubik’s Cube I’d rather get a robot to solve it for me,” said Pogue, who spent months working on his project.

Pogue, who had the inspiration for the idea in his second year, built his robot out of lego gears, web cams, motors, light sensors and micro controllers. It uses complex software to determine puzzle solutions. There are approximately 43 quintillion different positions the cube can be in.

“It uses a lot of clever logic to figure out the short solution.”

Engineering Physics students Chris Adams-McGavin, Amanda Kelly, Brandon Wagstaff and Mike Zamboni also created a sophisticated robot for their final year capstone project. Dubbed VIRGIL or Voice-activated Intelligent Robot with Guided Imaging Limb, the device acts as a robot helper to perform various tasks, such as handing someone tools or sorting objects based on size or colour.

It was a huge learning experience for the teammates, who hope to commercialize their project.

“It’s definitely daunting at the beginning,” said Kelly. ”You have this idea of what you want at the end and then it seems like a big task. I just think breaking it down into smaller steps is really helpful.”

This year’s events feature more than 48 projects (41 from ECE) and more than 180 students.

Some of the project highlights include:

• In-crib neonatal system for monitoring physiological changes related to the onset of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) (ECE)
• iDoC: Instant Diagnosis of Condition – Triage app for your phone to help with instantaneous diagnosis of a concussion based on analyzing the eyes. A 3D display system that utilises diffused LEDs to display multiple objects and patterns. (ECE)
• SmartCharge – WiFi Connected Vehicle Charger (ECE)
• Tactile Height Varying Shape Display – A small table with several pins that move up and down to display a contour that is scanned by a Kinect (ECE)
• Maze-Solving Mouse: This Robot has the capacity to solve any 16X16 maze within a timeframe of 15 seconds or less. (Engineering Physics)
• Quadog: Security system that can survey an area and follow designed persons of interest. (Engineering Physics)

Texas Instruments, Hatch, Hydro One, Hamilton Health Sciences, Altera and Pivotal are supporting the ECE Expo competition. Representatives from several of the companies will also be judging the competition.