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Description:

Working in small teams, students will design, build, and program a medical-assist robot capable of one of the following medical-related tasks: telepresence (to minimize in-person interactions), remote patient processing and vitals inspection, autonomous delivery of critical supplies, shut-in companionship (must be soft, cuddly, and cute), or autonomous sanitization of areas and surfaces.

The class will focus on construction and programming, with heavy emphasis on design of functional robots. The medical robots will be programmed to sense and react to their environment, users, or patients through sensors. Sensors for medical robots may include: digital infrared (IR) temperature, IR proximity, mini-LIDAR (laser radar), gesture (for patient input/communication with the robot), heart-rate, galvanic skin response, muscle movement, and cameras.

Teams will conduct research, apply the engineering design process, follow the general rules and conventions of the engineering profession, including maintaining an engineering notebook. Teams will be using the Tetrix Prime robotics system, Grove sensors, and other components to build the robot, and Arduino software to program it. Each robot will be put through a series of tests/challenges related to the specific robot design. Please note that students do not get to keep finished projects.

Topics in this Series: Medical Robots (Semester 1) and Autonomous Delivery Vehicles (Semester 2). Students continuing from first semester receive priority pre-registration for second semester.

Prerequisites: None

Workload: Students should expect to spend 0-1 hours per week outside of class researching robot and automation design

Assessments: Ongoing feedback is provided in class on construction and programming. Formal assessments are not provided.

Credit: Homeschool families may wish to count this course as a component (partial) credit in Technology or Career Exploration for purposes of a high school transcript.