Mars is easy, Maury 201 is tough… - by Prof. Bishop

Modern mobile robots are required to traverse increasingly challenging terrain, from the surface of an alien planet to the depths of a collapsed building. Building robots to move through these extreme environments requires a new way of thinking about mobility.

Students in ES451, Mobile Robot Design, face a rite of passage each Fall as Maury 201 is transformed into one of the most difficult navigation challenges imaginable. Robots are subjected to a tortuous obstacle course comprising bolt-studded hills, steep inclines, deep, obstacle-strewn sand, and the dreaded gap (into which at least one hapless robot tumbles every class period).


Students whose robot can make it unaided through the entire course receive the ultimate accolade from the instructors: a perfect score on the challenge and excusal from writing a lab report.

The task is not for the faint of heart, and more than one robot has met its untimely demise at the bottom of heartbreak hill or dug its own sandy grave in the pit of despair.


But for those students with determination, engineering savvy, and some serious hardware design chops, the terrain challenge offers an unparalleled sense of accomplishment and a chance at immortality, enshrined alongside those happy few whose robots have faced down this ultimate test of machine vs. terrain.

Check em out!

Courtney & Doliente


Vegel, Healey