Austrian expert to speak in WIT on energy potential of robot soccer in space

The potential for delivering solar power from outer space to earth will be explored by a leading Austrian academic when he briefs staff and students at Waterford Institute of Technology on Monday next (October 2) about a Japanese/European study involving the use of robot soccer players in earth’s orbit.

Prof Peter Kopacek has headed up the Institute for Handling Devices & Robotics at Vienna University of Technology since 1990 and is President of the Austrian Society for Systems Engineering and Automation.

The author of six textbooks and more than 250 academic articles on robotics and information technology in automation, Prof Kopacek has been actively contributing to the field of advanced systems engineering for a quarter of a century. During this time, he has conducted over 30 systems engineering-related courses and seminars and continues to lecture and research at the University of Linz as well as Vienna University of Technology.

Prof Kopacek has developed courses in mobile, intelligent and cooperative robotic systems. His work has led to the introduction of robot applications to curricula in Austria and topics covered include the use of robots in medicine and healthcare as well as in clearing landmines and the use of robotic systems for entertainment, leisure and hobbies.

Earlier this year, Prof Kopacek became the first Austrian to receive the industry’s ultimate honour, an Engelberger Robotics Award. Honouring significant achievements in the areas of leadership, application, education and technology development, the awards are named after the “father of robotics”, Joseph F Engelberger.

Now being applied in space as part of efforts to identify alternative energy sources for earth, Prof Kopacek’s interest in robot soccer was sparked in September 1997 when two Korean teams demonstrated the sport at the Vienna University of Technology. He started the first Austrian robot soccer team in 1998 and since then Prof Kopacek and his colleagues have helped develop the ‘sport’ to a point where it has pan-European and global competitions.

According to Dr Larry Stapleton of the ISOL Research Centre in the Department of Computing, Mathematics and Physics at Waterford Institute of Technology, “Prof Kopacek is a world leader in advanced systems engineering and we are tremendously excited that he’s agreed to speak in Waterford in what is the first of a series of seminars and lectures we will host between now and the year-end. Our series will bring a number of leading thinkers in computing and information systems to Ireland.

“As well as being fascinating for its application of 21^st century advanced technologies, the work that Prof Kopacek is involved in with robot soccer in space has tremendous potential in exploring how we can tap in to extra-terrestrial resources as we seek out alternative energy sources for earth now that our oil dependency can no longer be sustained.”

Members of the public are welcome to attend Prof Kopacek’s presentation in the auditorium at Waterford Institute of Technology’s Cork Road campus on Monday, October 2 at 4.15pm.

Ends

For further information please contact:

Edel Flynn – Bracken PR – (01) 677 3277

2. DUBLIN

"NASA’s Vision for Space Exploration and ESA's Aurora Program"

By Kevin Nolan of the Planetary Society

Trinity College Dublin, Monday October 9 at 8pm

For almost fifty years our ventures into space have been incredibly successful - sending people to the Moon, robotic reconnaissance of the Solar System and rovers to Mars, for example. But our aspirations (and the resulting challenges) of space exploration are rapidly expanding.

With plans of a permanent Moon base by about 2020, deep space telescopes such as the Terrestrial Planet Finder and LISA and a human mission to Mars in 2033, space exploration must be pursued from here on in a fundamentally different way.

In response, both NASA and ESA have developed and are already implementing far-reaching strategies to achieve such space exploration over the coming decades.

This lecture will provide an overview of those strategies, the resulting roadmaps, programs and planned missions to accomplish our goals.

The lecture also explains how through ‘phased and synchronized’ priorities and milestones by both ESA and NASA; major projects such as sending to people to Mars (perhaps unachievable by any one organization) become politically, economically and socially viable.

Speaker: Kevin Nolan is lecturer in Physics at the Institute of Technology, Tallaght, Dublin. As part of ongoing PhD research, Kevin is a software developer for ESA’s ‘INTEGRAL’ multi-wavelength space observatory; and coordinator to Ireland for The Planetary Society (founded by Carl Sagan, Bruce Murray and Louis Friedman).

Admission: 5euro (3euro members and concessions)

Get tickets from the Astronomy Ireland Shop or book online at www.astronomy.ie

Venue: Schrodinger Theatre, Fitzgerald Building, Trinity College, Dublin 2.
(Near the Westland Row or Lincoln Place entrances - see maps on website above)

Further events at www.astronomy.ie/events

3. DVD

A DVD will be produced of the above Dublin NASA lecture for just 5euro for anyone who wants a copy.

Let us know if you want one by ordering now on www.astronomy.ie/lectureDVD.html

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