Participating Teams 2007 – RoboCup Standard Platform League

NUbots	Australia Team Contact: Stephan Chalup, Rick Middleton, Robert King, Michael Quinlan Institutes: School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences The University of Newcastle
Team Profile:	1st at RoboCup 2006, 2nd at RoboCup 2005, 3rd place at RoboCup 2002, 2003, and 2004.
Research Topics:	control, bayesian statistics, machine learning, robot vision, neurocomputing, dimensionality reduction, kernel machines
Team Report:	NUbotFinalReport2006.pdf

Microsoft Hellhounds	Germany Team Contact: Matthias Hebbel, Walter Nistico Institutes: Robotics Research Institute Information Technology Universität Dortmund
Team Profile:	Microsoft Hellhounds (formerly known as Ruhrpott Hellhounds), while a newcomer at RoboCup 2006, is one of the oldest and most successful teams in the history of the Four-Legged League. The team was founded in the autumn of 2001, as a project group for students of Computer Science. In spring 2002 it took part to its first competition, German Open 2002, and joined the GermanTeam, a joint effort of the Humboldt University of Berlin, the Bremen University, and the Technical University of Darmstadt, to take part in the RoboCup World Championships as a national team. Together with the other members of the GermanTeam, Microsoft Hellhounds won the Technical Challenge competition at RoboCup 2003, and the Soccer Competition in 2004 and 2005. As an individual team, Microsoft Hellhounds won the German Open 2005, RoboGames 2005, US/German Championship 2005 (defeating the winner of the US Open 2005), Dutch Open 2006 and US Open 2006. Due to its large amount of team members, after RoboCup 2005, Microsoft Hellhounds left the GermanTeam with the intent to compete as a new team at RoboCup 2006.
Research Topics:	machine learning, evolutionary algorithms, robot vision, sensor modeling and fusion, multiagent systems
Team Report:	MSH06TeamReport.pdf

GermanTeam 2007	Germany Team Contact: Thomas Röfer Institutes: Humboldt Universität Berlin Universität Bremen Technische Universität Darmstadt DFKI Lab Bremen
Team Profile:	see http://www.germanteam.org/
Research Topics:	see GT2005.pdf, section 1.2
Team Report:	GermanTeam2006tdp.pdf, further publications

Cerberus	Turkey Team Contact: H. Levent Akin Institutes: Bogazici University
Team Profile:	Team consists of graduate and undergraduate students of BU AILAB. Cerberus participated in Robocup 2001, 2002, 2003, 2005 and 2006. Cerberus was ranked 1st in the Technical Challenges in 2005 and made it to the quarterfinals in 2006. Cerberus took the fourth place in RoboCup? German Open 2007.
Research Topics:	Localization, multi-agent task allocation, path planning and obstacle avoidance, reinforcement learning, POMDP
Team Report:	Cerberus06Report.pdf

Wright Eagle	China Team Contact: Xiaoping CHEN Institutes: University of Science and Technology of China
Team Profile:	WrightEagle is the first Chinese team ever participating in RoboCup (2000, simulation) and the first Chinese real-robot team (2001, 4-legged). The team got top 8 both in simulation league (2D competitions from 2001 to 2003 and 3D in 2004) and in 4-legged league (2001-2003).
Research Topics:	The team?s major research topics include Multi-Agent Systems, Human-Machine Interaction, and Agent learning.
Team Report:	WrightEagle2006.pdf

ARAIBO	Japan Team Contact: Tamio ARAI Institutes: The University of Tokyo and Chuo University
Team Profile:	We have participated in Four-legged robot league since 1999.
Research Topics:	See ARAIBO_TechnicalReport2004.pdf
Team Report:	ARAIBO_TechnicalReport2006.pdf

ASURA	Japan Team Contact: OHASHI Takeshi Institutes: Kyushu Institute of Technology Fukuoka Institute of Technology
Team Profile:	Our team was organized by KIT(Kyushu Institute of Technology) and FIT(Fukuoka Institute of Technology) in January of 2001. We have been successfully participating in the four-legged league of RoboCup since 2001.
Research Topics:	Distributed systems, Object oriented programming, Multi-agent systems, and Human-Computer interaction
Team Report:	KyushuUnited2006TechReport.pdf

BabyTigers DASH	Japan Team Contact: Yohei KASHIMURA Institutes: Osaka City University Ryukoku University Osaka University Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International Intelligent Robotics and Communications Laboratories
Team Profile:	Our team was organized by Osaka University and Osaka City University in this competition. We have reconstructed the whole program for ERS-7 based on our past experiences.
Research Topics:	Computer Vision, Monte Carlo Localization method, MultiAgent Systems

CMDash’07	U.S.A. Team Contact: Manuela Veloso, Juan Fasola Institutes: Carnegie Mellon University
Team Profile:	Our Carnegie Mellon CMDash’07 team investigates new research directions and builds upon our CMPack’00-06 and CMTrio’98-99 teams. We have participated in the RoboCup international and local competitions since 1998, placing in the top three places several times. Recently, we were awarded first place among the US teams and second place overall in the RoboCup US Open 2006. With CMDash’07, we improve individual robot perception, behaviors, motions, state estimation of opponent robots, and multi-robot coordination. CMDash’07 also follows a new research focus on responding to the opponent team, namely through low-level navigation that accounts for other robots and the use of different team strategy plays.
Research Topics:	Multirobot systems, learning, teamwork, communication, collaboration, vision, perception
Team Report:	CMDash07-report.pdf

DEN-INU	Japan Team Contact: Takashi Sato Institutes: Tokyo Denki University,Department of Science and Engineering
Team Profile:	DEN-INU is a team for the RoboCup? four-legged league, developed at Tokyo Denki University. We started this project in March 2006.
Research Topics:	Computer vision, self localization, multi-agent system, machine learning

Eagle Knights	Mexico Team Contact: Alfredo Weitzenfeld Institutes: Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM)
Team Profile:	The Eagle Knights AIBO Team was founded in January 2004. We played our first official games at the US Open 2004. Eagle Knights have participated in both last RoboCups? (2005 and 2006) where we reached the second round and have participated in both last RoboCup? Latin America Open where we reached the third place in 2005 and fisrt place in 2006. Our team is made of undergraduate students only.
Research Topics:	Biorobotics, Social Cognition, Human Robot Interface

FC Twaves	Japan Team Contact: Hiroyuki Okada Institutes: Tokai University, Department of Mathematical Sciences, Tamagawa University, Department of Intelligent Information Systems
Team Profile:	We participated Four-Legged League since 2005. Our team is organaized with Tokai University and Tamagawa University since 2006. Twaves team took 4th place at the 2006 Japan Open.
Research Topics:	Visualization, Reinforcement Learning

Impossibles	Iran Team Contact: Hamid Reza Vaezi Joze
Research Topics:	Artificial Inteligence and Robotics
Team Report:	impossibles_report_2006.pdf

Jolly Pochie	Japan Team Contact: Akira Ishino Institutes: Department of Informatics, Kyushu University, Department of System Information Sciences, Tohoku Univeristy
Team Profile:	see http://www.jollypochie.org/
Research Topics:	Machine learning, machine discovery, data mining, image processing, string processing, software architecture, visualization.
Team Report:	JollyPochie2006TR.pdf

LTU Blue Devils	U.S.A. Team Contact: CJ Chung, Emily Trudell Institutes: Lawrence Technological University Department of Math and Computer Science
Team Profile:	See the team page at http://ltu164.ltu.edu/aibo
Research Topics:	(Cooperative) robotics using softcomputing (neural + evolutionary computing + fuzzy); Robotics education through competitions and exhibitions (see http://www.robofest.net).
Team Report:	LTU Blue Devils Technical Report 2007 (pdf)

Metrobots	U.S.A. Team Contact: Simon Parsons Institutes: Brooklyn College of the City University of New York
Team Profile:	See the team page at http://agents.sci.brooklyn.cuny.edu/metrobots/
Research Topics:	decision making, multi-robot coordination, machine learning, vision, educational robotics.

Northern Bites	U.S.A. Team Contact: Henry Work, Eric Chown
Team Profile:	Bowdoin College’s Northern Bites began in Spring 2005. Though we are mostly undergrads balancing full class loads, we enjoy RoboCup as an escape from the standard academic methods of problem sets, examinations, and essays. Team member quotes as to why they joined the nBites: “I was interested in the application of advanced mathematics in a computerized environment.” – Mark McGranaghan ;”I hoped to finally succeed in competition after losing at years of sports in school” – Joho Strom;”Nothing shows the inanity of our human existence more then robot dogs running on carpet.” – George Slavov. You can read all about our glories and downfalls at our state of the art blog: http://robocup.bowdoin.edu
Research Topics:	cognitive architecture, machine learning, python, RoboCup for education
Team Report:	NorthernBites2006Report.pdf

sharPKUngfu	China Team Contact: Guangming Xie, Chunxia Rong, Qining Wang Institutes: Peking University
Team Profile:	Here
Research Topics:	Here
Team Report:	Here

SPQR+ISOCROB	Italy/Portugal Team Contact: Luca Iocchi, Pedro M U A Lima Institutes: Institute for Systems and Robotics Instituto Superior Técnico
Team Profile:	SPQR + ISocRob is a joint team between two research groups: SPQR (Italy) and IsocRob (Portugal), formed as a coordinated heterogeneous multi-robot team
Research Topics:	‘Heterogeneous multi-robot coordination’, with the main focus on the use of a common high-level plan representation formalism based on Petri Nets that allows for modeling relational behaviors. Other research activities can be found in spqr.dis.uniroma.it and socrob.isr.ist.utl.pt

TecRams	Mexico Team Contact: Jorge Alfonso Ramirez Uresti Institutes: Tecnologico de Monterrey, Campus Estado de Mexico
Team Profile:	Our team consists mainly of undergraduate students of engineering and two graduate students. Our first participation was in 2002. Since then we have participated every year in international competitions. For more information see http://www.cem.itesm.mx/robocup
Research Topics:	Evolutionary computing, Multiagent learning, Multiagent strategies, Robot vision in natural conditions, Control

TJArk	China Team Contact: Qijun Chen Institutes: Tongji University
Team Profile:	TJArk was established in 2004 as a part of the Lab of Robot &Intelligent Control of Tongji University in China,and participated in RoboCup for the first time in 2006.
Research Topics:	machine vision, motion control of quadruped robot, machine learning, self localization,multi-agent system .etc.

UChile Kiltros	Chile Team Contact: Javier Ruiz-del-Solar Institutes: Department of Electrical Engineering, Universidad de Chile
Team Profile:	Team creation: December 2002. Former participations: RoboCup 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006. Main Achievement: RoboCup-2004 Engineering Challenge Award (paper “UCHILSIM: A Dynamically and Visually Realistic Simulator for the RoboCup Four Legged League” by Zagal&Ruiz-del-Solar) Detailed team profile in http://www.robocup.cl/four.htm
Research Topics:	Robot vision, probabilistic decision making, machine learning, self-localization and evolutionary robotics. We have also developed UCHILSIM, a realistic simulator for the four-legged league. Relevant publications in http://www.robocup.cl/four/publications.htm

UT Austin Villa 2007	U.S.A. Team Contact: Peter Stone Institutes: Department of Computer Sciences The University of Texas at Austin
Team Profile:	Our team started as a class project in January of 2003. At RoboCup 2003 in Padua, our goal was just to participate. We lost all of our official games, though were able to win some exhibitions and achieved the fourth highest result in the challenge competition, including the second highest score in the obstacle avoidance challenge. We finished in third place at the 2004 and 2005 US Opens in April, and reached the quarterfinals of RoboCup 2004 and 2005. Also see our team reports (2003, 2004, 2005, 2006) for details.
Research Topics:	Machine learning, Multiagent systems, Learned locomotion and ball capturing, Robust vision, color constancy, Automatic sensor-action model callibration