The Winning Alliances of the Zero Robotics 2017 Tournament
ISS crew members Sasha Misurkin and Joe Acaba were referees for the 2017 Zero Robotics High School Finals.
Media Credit: NASA
The Zero Robotics High School 2017 Champions have been selected!
On January 11, 2018, over 600 students gathered to watch cosmonaut Alexander “Sasha” Misurkin and NASANational Aeronautics and Space Administration astronaut Joe Acaba referee the final competition of the Zero Robotics High School Tournament 2017 onboard the International Space Station. The 2017 contest, called LIFE SPHERES, challenged student teams to write code to control the SPHERES satellites in the search for life on Enceladus, a moon of Saturn, by drilling in the icy surface, avoiding geysers and returning samples to a base station for analysis.
Media Credit: NASA
Zero Robotics is a free program for middle and high schoolers that provides a unique, challenging, and inspiring learning experience. Students can participate year after year, because the challenges change each year! You don’t need any experience with programming to get started. Zero Robotics connects you with mentors and helpful resources.
This year’s high school champions are BeachPin1701 and Naughty Prions and Lions!
If the names of the tournament winners seem odd, it’s because they are fusions of several team names. In the weeks before the High School Finals on the ISSInternational Space Station, individual teams worked their way up the rankings by winning local and regional competitions. When they reached the finals, the teams grouped together in alliances and chose new names by creatively interweaving their component teams’ names.
- BeachPin1701 is an international alliance of three teams who ranked top in their countries: Beachbotics (USA), ZeroZeroPinin (Italy), and ENTERPRISE (Italy).
- Naughty Prions and Lions comprises teams from Italy and the United States: Stuy-Naught (USA), PR1SM5 (USA), and Space Lions (Italy).