São Paulo – Three Brazilian student teams have joined First Lego League, a robotics competition taking place in Byblos, Lebanon from Friday (14) to Sunday (16). The teams are: FrancoDroid, from Rio de Janeiro; Conectados, from Paraná; and Galaxy Forces, from Rio Grande do Norte (pictured above). The Brazilians qualified in the SESI National Robotics Tournament last March in Rio
The students are already in Lebanon. They will compete on the first and last day of the event. The tournament is part of an international program designed to encourage children and youths aged 9-16 to study and produce science and technology. Participating teams are required to program a robot built from Lego blocks in order to score points in a thematic game field (The Robot Game).
The championship involves two other parts: using this year’s theme to develop a project that poses a problem and presents its solution. This year’s theme is “In Orbit.” The other challenge is for the team to do all its work based on its own core values. The event features 74 teams and 500 competitors from 46 countries. The teams have created projects involving design, engineering and software for their robots, apart from the project itself.
The Rio-based team is FrancoDroid, from Colégio Liceu Franco-Brasileiro. They have created the Cosmo Cup – Space Menstrual Cup. The project is an unheard-of alternative to deal with women’s periods in space in a healthy, sustainable way.
The Conectados team from Paraná comprises 10 students from Escola Municipal Coronel Durival Britto e Silva. Their project is designed to address astronaut anxiety with lavender extract capsules.
Galaxy Forces, out of Mossoró, Rio Grande do Norte, is the first team from the state to make it into the championship’s international phase, according to Ana Karenine, the educational director at SESI Escola Mossoró/RN – their school. The students ascertained that astronauts under low gravity will lose muscle mass. The solution was to design a vest using therabands, which are used in physical therapy, so the space travelers can exercise as needed. “The whole project is themed as though the astronauts were Power Rangers ready to save the universe,” explained Karenine, in a reference to the superhero TV Show.
The team’s coach is schoolteacher Leonardo Garcia. The competing students are Renalle Fátima, José Alfredo, Vanessa Praxedes, Lucas Rock and Néfi Ângelo. They are accompanied by Ana Karenine and SESI robotics coordinator Anderson Vieira.
Garcia explains that completing the project in a month’s time required dedication from the team. “Since then significant improvements happened, with the outfit [designed by the students]. Professional contacts were very enriching, since they led the students to learn biology, anatomy and physical therapy, as well as the physical phenomena involving the vest and theraband elasticity,” the schoolteacher told ANBA.
Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
