SciBorg is a simple robot built by Wellesley junior Ruth Chuang during the summer of 1995. Ruth is working with Wellesley professors Robbie Berg (physics) and Franklyn Turbak (computer science) to develop an introductory college-level science course based on robots.
SciBorg is a Lego "creature" that can sense and respond to its environment. It "sees" with two reflectance sensors, "hears" with a clap detector, "feels" with a touch sensor, "talks" with a beeper, and "walks" via two independently driven wheels. SciBorg's behavior is determined by a "brain" that controls the actuators (wheels, beeper) based on inputs from the sensors (reflectance, clap, and touch sensors). The brain is a computer (the Handy Board ) programmed in a high-level language ( Handy Logo ), both of which were designed by MIT's Epistemology and Learning Group. It is easy to program SciBorg to do simple tasks like following a line (press here for a movie) and finding its way through an obstacle course.
We believe that robots like SciBorg can serve as the basis for accessible, engaging, and multi-disciplinary design projects in science and engineering within a liberal arts setting. Robots have already proven to be effective pedagogical tools in environments ranging from grade school classrooms to MIT's 6.270 robot design contest. Our goal at Wellesley is to develop activities and materials that will attract and sustain the interest of students who would otherwise have little opportunity to "do science". We are particularly interested in projects that are appealing to women, who are traditionally underrepresented in science and engineering fields.