A team of undergraduate students from Cal Poly, led by electrical engineering Professor Siavash Farzan, has achieved a significant milestone by being selected as one of the top 10 teams to advance to the hardware stage of the Self-Driving Car Student Competition.
The event, powered by Quanser, is scheduled to take place during the 2024 American Control Conference (ACC) in Toronto from July 10-12. ACC is a flagship event for research in automatic control and systems theory.
For the past two quarters, Farzan has been advising a group of underrepresented undergraduate students from across three majors in The Noyce School of Applied Computing – electrical engineering, computer engineering and computer science – through the Learning Aligned Employment Program at Cal Poly.
“This is a significant accomplishment for our students, especially since our team is composed solely of undergraduates, while many other teams included graduate students who often have more research experience,” Farzan said. “Our students have demonstrated exceptional skill and commitment in research and innovation, which has been recognized on an international level.”
The team’s dedication and hard work culminated in their successful simulation results in a virtual environment, placing them among the elite teams advancing to the hardware stage. Out of 39 teams from 28 universities worldwide, only 10, including Cal Poly, moved forward.
These teams will now work with the physical QCar – the feature vehicle of Quanser’s Self-Driving Car Studio – to face a series of rigorous challenges designed to test their self-driving algorithms.
The Self-Driving Car Student Competition is conducted in three stages: virtual design and submission, algorithm validation on physical vehicles and an on-site demonstration. Tasks include completing a circuit path, accurate driving, timely reactions to stop signs and traffic lights, and avoidance of obstacles.
The contest is designed to provide students from around the globe with a platform to acquire leading-edge knowledge and develop critical problem-solving skills.
The selection of Cal Poly’s team is a testament to the university’s commitment to fostering innovation and excellence in engineering education. For the students involved, the competition offers practical experience in real-time decision-making, feedback control and perception systems, which are crucial for achieving the fast and precise driving performance required in autonomous vehicles.
“This competition is not only a chance to gain valuable experience but also to be part of a global community of next-generation researchers and innovators,” an event spokesperson said.
For more information about the competition, visit the 2024 ACC Conference Student Competition page.
About the Noyce School
The Noyce School of Applied Computing is home to the first interdisciplinary school of its kind at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo thanks to a transformative $60 million gift from the Robert N. Noyce Trust.
Housed within the College of Engineering, The Noyce School of Applied Computing combines three departments — Electrical Engineering, Computer Science and Software Engineering, and Computer Engineering — with Statistics joining as an affiliate, paving the way for students and faculty using computer principles, concepts and technologies to address real-world problems.
