Thoughtware.TV

Mechanical Micro Mice Manage Massive Mazes

Micromouse competitions seem to be big news. The premise is simple: autonomous little mousebots try to find their way to the center of a maze. In practice, this can be a tricky task to do quickly and efficiently. The mouse has to be able to detect walls, make decisions about where and when to turn, and remember where it’s been in the maze. After the mouse finds the center, it’ll try to figure out what the fastest route is, and then run it at top speed, which is startlingly fast for such a little bot (and so many sharp turns). This particular video was taken at Techfest 2008 in Bombay, India: