Participating Teams 2010 – RoboCup Standard Platform League

Austrian-Kangaroos	Austria Team Contact: Dietmar Schreiner, Alexander Hofmann, Markus Bader Institutes: Vienna University of Technology – Institute of Computer Languages, Compilers and Languages Group University of Applied Sciences Technikum Wien Vienna University of Technology – Automation and Control Institute
Team Profile:	The Austrian Kangaroos are a young team, consisting of undergraduates, graduates and researchers from the Vienna University of Technology and the University of Applied Sciences Technikum Wien. The Kangaroos participated in RoboCup for the first time in Graz, 2009, where they reached the quarterfinals.
Research Topics:	computer vision, computational intelligence, social and management aspects in mid to large scale project teams.

B-Human	Germany Team Contact: Thomas Roefer Institutes: DFKI Bremen University of Bremen
Team Profile:	Our team consists of students in the advanced study period and of scientific employees from the University of Bremen and the DFKI Bremen. B-Human participated in the Humanoid Kid Size League at RoboCup 2007 and 2008. We also participated as BreDoBrothers, a cooperation with the TU Dortmund, in the Standard Platform League in 2008 as well as in the Humanoid Kid Size League 2006. In 2009, B-Human participated in the Standard Platform League and won the RoboCup German Open, the RoboCup World Championship, and the RoboCup Technical Challenge.
Research Topics:	Probabilistic state estimation, real-time computer vision, robot simulation, and gait optimization
Team Report:	bhuman09_coderelease.pdf

Borregos	Mexico Team Contact: Leonardo Garrido, Ph.D. Institutes: Department of Computer Science, Tecnológico de Monterrey, Campus Monterrey
Team Profile:	Borregos is a new team in the Standard Platform League but has been participating in the RoboCup competitions since 2004, starting in the 2D Simulation League and moving forward to the 3D Simulation League with spheres in 2006, the 3D Simulation League with humanoids in 2007, the 3D Simulation League with naos in 2008 and 2009 and also the RobotStadium Simulation League since 2008. Currently, our team is mainly formed by students in our M.Sc. in Intelligent Systems.
Research Topics:	Computer vision, self localization, multiagent task allocation, reinforcement learning

BURST	Israel Team Contact: Gal Kaminka, Eli Kolberg, Matan Keidar, Eran Polosetski Institutes: Maverick lab, Department of Computer Science, Bar-Ilan University School of Engineering, Bar-Ilan University
Team Profile:	Team consists of graduate and undergraduate students of Bar-Ilan University. BURST participated in Robocup 2009. BURST qualified to the top 16 in Robocup 2009.
Research Topics:	Learning bi-pedal walking, Multi-robot formations, Multi-robot area patrol, Visual SLAM
Team Report:	BURST09Report.pdf

Cerberus	Turkey Team Contact: H. Levent Akın Institutes: Department of Computer Engineering, Bogazici University
Team Profile:	The team consists of graduate students of BU AILab. Cerberus has been actively participating in RoboCup since 2001, except the year 2004. Cerberus was ranked 1st in the Technical Challenges in 2005 and made it to the quarterfinals in 2006 and 2008. Cerberus took the fourth place in RoboCup German Open 2007.
Research Topics:	Self localization, multi-agent task allocation, path planning and obstacle avoidance, reinforcement learning, POMDPs

CHITA Hominids	Italy Chile Team Contact: Luca Iocchi, Javier Ruiz-del-Solar Institutes: Department of Computer and System Sciences, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy Advanced Mining Technology Center, Universidad de Chile
Team Profile:	CHITA Hominids is the CHIlean-ITAlian joint effort in RoboCup Standard Platform League, formed by the groups: UChile (Chile) and SPQR (Italy). The UChile robotics team (http://www.robocup.cl), led by Javier Ruiz-del-Solar, is an effort of the Department of Electrical Engineering of the Universidad de Chile in order to foster research in mobile robotics. The team is involved in RoboCup competitions since 2003 in different leagues: Four-legged 2003-2007, @Home in 2007-2009, Humanoid in 2007-2009, and Standard Platform League in 2008-2009. SPQR (http://spqr.dis.uniroma1.it), led by Luca Iocchi, is the group of the Faculty of Engineering at Sapienza University of Rome in Italy, that is involved in RoboCup competitions since 1998 in different leagues: Middle-size 1998-2002, Four-legged 2000-2007, Real-rescue-robots 2003-2006, @Home in 2006, Virtual-rescue since 2006 and Standard platform League (Nao Division) since 2008.
Research Topics:	Knowledge Representation, Plan representation, High-level robot programming, Multi-Robot Coordination, Robot Learning, Computer Vision, Localization, Cooperative perception.

CMurfs	USA Team Contact: Somchaya Liemhetcharat Institutes: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University
Team Profile:	CMurfs – Carnegie Mellon United Robots for Soccer is a RoboCup team developed in the CORAL group of CMU, and we have been participating in RoboCup since 1997, in different leagues such as SSL and SPL.
Research Topics:	Artificial intelligence, Multi-robot Coordination, Legged robot motion planning, Path planning, Computer vision, Localization, POMDPs

Kouretes	Greece Team Contact: Michail G. Lagoudakis, Nikos Vlassis Institutes: Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering, Technical University of Crete Department of Production Engineering and Management, Technical University of Crete
Team Profile:	Kouretes is the RoboCup team of the Technical University of Crete, Chania, Greece. The team is a collaboration of the Intelligent Systems Laboratory at the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering and the Intelligent Systems and Robotics Laboratory at the Department of Production Engineering and Management and consists mainly of undergraduate students working on their diploma thesis on selected robocup-related topics. The team participates in RoboCup competitions since 2006. Kouretes ranked 2nd in the MSRS contest at RoboCup 2007, 1st in the SPL-MSRS league at RoboCup 2008, 3rd in the SPL-Nao league at RoboCup 2008, among the top 8 teams in the SPL-Webots league at RoboCup 2008, and 6th in the SPL-Webots league at RoboCup 2009.
Research Topics:	Motion Design, Localization, Communication, Reinforcement Learning, Adaptive Color Segmentation

L3M	France Spain Team Contact: Vincent Hugel Institutes: Laboratory of System Engineering, Versailles University
Team Profile:	The joint team will be composed of students and professors from French and Spanish Universities, namely Versailles University, University of Murcia, Paris 8 University , Technical University of Valencia and French EFREI Engineering School. The original team participated in the AIBO league from 1998 to 2005, and in the rescue league from 2003 to 2005. Best results include 1st rank in 1999, 2nd in 2001, and fourth in 2002.
Research Topics:	Mobile robotics, motion planning, legged locomotion – gaits and transitions, embedded vision, integrated systems
Team Report:	2009_SPL_French_Team_Report.pdf

MRL	Iran Team Contact: Ehsan Hashemi Institutes: Mechatronics Research Laboratory, Department of Electrical, Computer and IT Engineering, Qazvin Azad university
Team Profile:	MRL is a research laboratory that is an active participant of RoboCup from 2003 in different leagues such as Rescue Robot, Middle size, Small size, Simulations leagues and so on. MRL SPL Team is formed last year and consist of graduate and undergraduate students of Qazvin Azad University.
Research Topics:	Machine Vision, Self Localization, Multi-agent Coordination, Path planning and Obstacle avoidance, Modeling and Control

Nao Devils Dortmund	Germany Team Contact: Stefan Czarnetzki Institutes: Robotics Research Institute, TU Dortmund
Team Profile:	The team consists of researchers and students of TU Dortmund University. We participate in RoboCup competitions since 2002 with several different teams: Microsoft Hellhounds and as part of the German Team (4-Legged-League), DoHBots (Humanoid League), and BreDoBrothers (together with University Bremen) and now as Nao Devils Dortmund in the Standard Platform League.
Research Topics:	biped walking, computer vision, stochastic filtering
Team Report:	NaoDevils09.pdf

Nao-Team HTWK	Germany Team Contact: Rico Tilgner Institutes: Faculty of Computer Science, Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Leipzig University of Applied Science
Team Profile:	The Nao-Team HTWK is a RoboCup team that consists of graduate and undergraduate students of Leipzig University of Applied Science and was founded in February 2009. The team participated in RoboCup German Open 2009 and reached the second place as well as the first place in the Technical Challenge of RoboCup 2009.
Research Topics:	Evolutionary Algorithms, Biped walking, Artificial intelligence, Multi-robot Coordination, Computer vision, Localization
Team Report:	techReportHTWK.pdf

NimbRo	Germany Team Contact: Matthias Nieuwenhuisen Institutes: Autonomous Intelligent Systems Group, Computer Science Institute VI, University of Bonn
Team Profile:	Our team is new to the SPL, but participated since 2004 with great success in the Humanoid League KidSize and TeenSize classes.
Research Topics:	Stabilization of walking, learning full-body motions from demonstrations and own expierience, hierarchical planning
Team Report:	TDP_NimbRo_SPL_2010.pdf

Northern Bites	USA Team Contact: Eric Chown, Jack Morrison Institutes: Department of Computer Science, Bowdoin College
Team Profile:	The Northern Bites are an entirely undergraduate student team from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. The Northern Bites have participated in the Standard Platform League since RoboCup 2006. The Northern Bites earned first, third, and second place in RoboCup 2007, 2008, and 2009, respectively.
Research Topics:	Bipedal Robotic Motion, Self-Localization, Artificial Intelligence, Robotic Teamwork, Computer Vision
Team Report:	NorthernBitesReport2009.pdf

NTU Robot PAL	Taiwan Team Contact: Chieh-Chih Wang, Shao-Chen Wang Institutes: Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering, National Taiwan University
Team Profile:	Team consists of graduate and undergraduate students from the Robot Perception and Learning Lab, CSIE, NTU. The team was one of the top 8 teams in RoboCup SPL 2009.
Research Topics:	Robot perception, robot learning, SLAMMOT, multi-robot localization and tracking, activity recognition
Team Report:	NTU_Robot_PAL_09Report.pdf

NUBots	Australia Team Contact: Steven Nicklin, Aaron Wong, Stephan Chalup Institutes: Newcastle Robotics Laboratory, Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, The University of Newcastle, Australia
Team Profile:	The NUbots are the robot soccer team of The University of Newcastle in Australia. They have participated in the RoboCup Standard Platform League since 2002. They achieved world-champion titles in 2006 and as part of the joint NUManoids team (Australia/Ireland) in 2008.
Research Topics:	Robot vision, machine learning, dimensionality reduction, localisation and Kalman filters, statistical computing, biped robot locomotion, anthropocentric biocybernetic computing.

Robo Eireann	Ireland Team Contact: Rick Middleton Institutes: The Hamilton Institute, The National University of Ireland Maynooth
Team Profile:	The team consists of undergraduates, graduates and academics from The Hamilton Institute, Computer Science and Electronic Engineering at NUI Maynooth. The team was formed late in 2007, and joined the University of Newcastle, Australia to compete as a joint team (NUManoids) who won the 2008 Nao competition. In 2009 NUI Maynooth and Newcastle will compete as individual teams.
Research Topics:	Localisation and world modelling using Gaussian Mixture models, Correlation based vision processing, active control & dynamic walks.

rUNSWift	Australia Team Contact: Bernhard Hengst, Maurice Pagnucco Institutes: School of Computer Science and Engineering, The University of New South Wales
Team Profile:	Team consists of CSE undergraduate students. UNSW had amazing success in the 4-Legged League of RoboCup when they participated from 1999 to 2006 – from eight attempts they made the final six times, winning the league three times and coming second another three times. This was even more impressive considering that the entire team of students were new each year, and that they were all undergraduates. In 2008 they moved up to the 2-Legged Nao League in the newly renamed Standard Platform League, where they were quarter finalists. They also competed in the 2009 SPL and will do so again in 2010.
Research Topics:	Machine learning, multi-robot coordination, human-robot interaction, reinforcement learning, AI planning.
Team Report:	http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~robocup/

TeamNanyang	Singapore Team Contact: Chen I-Ming, Xie Ming Institutes: School of Mechanical and Aearospce Engineering, Nanyang Technological University
Team Profile:	Team Nanyang was officially formed in May 2009 in the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Nanyang Technological University as a part of the program to train student’s hands-on engineering and system integration capability and nurturing future robotics and mechatronics researchers.The team consists of undergraduate students from MAE BEng and EEE BEng.
Research Topics:	Study of humanoid robot platform as a system integration tool, Robot vision, Humanoid robot Navigation, Biped locomotion, Formation coordination and self-localization.

TJArk	China Team Contact: CHEN Qijun Institutes: School of Electronics and Information, Tongji University
Team Profile:	TJArk was established in 2004 as a part of the Lab of Robot and Intelligent Control of Tongji University in China,and participated in RoboCup for the first time in 2006. We entered the quarter finals in RoboCup 2007 and RoboCup 2008. And we entered the eighth finals in the Standard Platform of RoboCup 2009.
Research Topics:	Machine Vision, Motion Control of Biped Robot, Machine Learning, Self Localization,Multi-agent System .etc.

TT-UT Austin Villa	USA Team Contact: Todd Hester Institutes: Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin Department of Computer Science, Texas Tech University
Team Profile:	Our team is a collaboration between Texas Tech University and the University of Texas at Austin. We participated in the Aibo league starting in 2003 and started with the Naos in 2007. We won the 2009 SPL US Open and made the quarterfinals in RoboCup 2009.
Research Topics:	Self localization, multi-agent task allocation, path planning and obstacle avoidance, reinforcement learning, POMDPs
Team Report:	pdf

UPennalizers	USA Team Contact: Daniel Lee Institutes: GRASP Lab, School of Engineering and Applied Science, University of Pensylvania
Team Profile:	The team consists of graduate and undergraduate students of the University of Pennsylvania lead by Dr Daniel Lee of the GRASP Lab. The UPennalizers have participated in the RoboCup SPL competition from 1999 through 2005 and returned in 2009 with a second place finish at the US Open.
Research Topics:	Self localization, path planning and obstacle avoidance, feedback based walk/motion engine, communication and collaboration
Team Report:	pdf

WrightEagleUnleashed!	China Australia Team Contact: Xiaoping Chen, Jinsu Liu, Mary-Anne Williams, Xun Wang Institutes: University of Science and Technology, China University University of Technology, Sydney
Team Profile:	Wright Eagle Unleashed! is a new NAO team created by uniting the University of Science and Technology China (Wright Eagle http://ai.ustc.edu.cn/) and the University of Technology Sydney Australia (UTS Unleashed! http://www.unleashed.it.uts.edu.au ) teams. Wright Eagle Unleashed! were Runners-Up in the Legged League in 2008. USTC has a strong record of success at RoboCup since competing in 1997 having won 4 Championships and 7 Runners Up at RoboCup competitions. UTS is known for its innovative style having developed the first dodge behavior in the legged league ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Diiv7kpW-ng ). The UTS Dodge was widely adopted after UTS introduced it in 2004. UTS Unleashed! were the Australian Champions in 2004 and won the Scientific Challenges, came 2nd in the Soccer at RoboCup 2004.
Research Topics:	Artificial intelligence, Multi-Robot Coordination, Legged Robot Motion Planning, Path Planning, Computer vision, Localization, Cognitive Modeling, Knowledge Representation, Attention, Anticipation and Autonomy

Zadeat	Germany Austria South Africa Team Contact: Tim Niemueller, Gerald Steinbauer, Anet Potgieter Institutes: Knowledge-Based Sustems Group, RWTH Aachen University Institute for Software Technology, Graz University of Technology Agents and Robotics Research Lab, University of Cape Town
Team Profile:	Zadeat is a multi-national project between the RWTH Aachen University, Graz University of Technology, and the University of Cape Town, and was founded in 2008 for participating in the new SPL. Robocup experience exists within the project from the previous teams AllemaniACs and Mostly Harmless in the Simluation League, the Middle-size League, and Robocup@Home.
Research Topics:	(logic-based) high-level control, model-based diagnosis, computational intelligence, hybrid conntrol