UNSW’s robot soccer team takes on the world

Australia’s robot soccer team from UNSW takes on the world next week in the globe’s biggest competition.

UNSW’s soccer playing robots in 2014, a year in which they took out the world title.

In today’s Higher Education Daily Brief: robot soccer, course in PNG’s main language, root canal without complications

Don’t forget about the Socceroobots

You may have heard of tomorrow night’s match in which the Socceroos will launch their World Cup Finals campaign in Russia by throwing everything at the French, in a vainglorious attempt to defeat the team who, in the opinion of some, are the ones most likely to take the globe’s most coveted trophy.

You probably haven’t heard of the RoboCup 2018 which kicks off Monday and Australia’s past world champions of robot soccer, the rUNSWifts from UNSW, will be taking on the best at the competition in Montreal. The rUNSWifts won the world title in 2014 and 2015 and last year made it to the quarter finals. They will be up against the giants of robot soccer, the University of Bremen’s B-Human team which won the title last year, their sixth win.

Each team is required to use the same hardware, a Nao humanoid robot from Softbank, and play five of them on a 6m x 9m field. The secret to winning is in the software. This year there will also be a simulated outdoor field with changing lighting conditions to challenge the little folks’ robotic vision.

So “go the rUNSWifts”. Give it to the Germans like the Socceroos are going to hand it to French. And can we call you the Socceroobots?

First uni course in PNG language

The Australian National University will be the first in Australia to teach Papua New Guinea’s most widely spoken language Tok Pisin. The course, which starts next year, will be taught online by Jenny Homerang, a PhD student in the School of Culture, History and Language.

“ANU is a pioneer in online language education and Tok Pisin is an important language in Papua New Guinea, because it brings the country’s diverse population together,” Ms Homerang said.

Tok Pisin is spoken by 4 million people. Papua New Guinea is one of the world’s most linguistically diverse nations with more than 800 living languages.

Safer root canal

Researchers at the University of Adelaide say they have successfully worked, in conjunction with Australian company Dentalife, to greatly reduce the chance of infection from root canal surgery.

Giampiero Rossi-Fedele from the university’s dental school, said they had identified a new formulation of chemical disinfectant which was much more effective than currently available products. The new product is expected to be available in the market in about 18 months.