Systems Track. Being able to map these large environments accurately will require teams to push the state of the art in robotics.

The second challenge will be meeting DARPA’s perception and mapping standards.

The US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has announced 17 qualified teams for the Subterranean (SubT) Challenge Urban Circuit that seeks to better equip warfighters and first responders to explore uncharted and dangerous underground environments.

The SubT Challenge asks teams to design robots that can create scalable 3D maps of underground environments that are many kilometers in size. Seventeen teams have qualified to participate in the DARPA Subterranean (SubT) Challenge Urban Circuit. Teams interested in qualifying in the Virtual competition for the Tunnel Circuit must submit a team registration and create an account for the SubT Challenge Virtual Portal. The SubT Challenge is organized into two competitions (Systems and Virtual), each with two tracks (DARPA-funded and self-funded). To qualify for future events for either the Systems or Virtual competitions in the SubT Challenge, teams may submit their qualification materials on a rolling basis. NUS SEDS: National University of Singapore Students for Exploration and Development of Space. Virtual Competition teams compete remotely via online submissions for each Circuit Event. The Final Event for Virtual competitors will be co-located and concurrent with the Final Event for the Systems Competition. Eleven teams will compete in the Systems competition at Satsop Business Park in Elma, Washington, Feb. 18-27, 2020. The US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has announced 17 qualified teams for the Subterranean (SubT) Challenge Urban Circuit that seeks to better equip warfighters and first responders to explore uncharted and dangerous underground environments.

The SubT Challenge Finals, which will integrate all three subdomains, is planned for 2021. ... artifacts, and tunnel-like environments, as a testbed for DARPA SubT Challenge. DARPA Subterranean Challenge: We participate in the DARPA co mpetition as CTU-CRAS-NORLAB t eam sele cted for DARPA Subterranean or "SubT" Challenge.For sixty years, DARPA has held to a singular and enduring mission: to make pivotal investments in breakthrough technologies for national security with its annual budget: $3.427 billion! The SubT Challenge is the latest incarnation of DARPA robotics challenges, with prior programs including the DARPA Robotics Challenge (humanoid robots), the DARPA Urban Challenge (autonomous city driving), and the DARPA Grand Challenge (autonomous ground vehicles). Eight teams qualified to participate in the Virtual competition, which will run Jan. 23-30.

When DARPA announced its Subterranean Challenge, the agency framed things with a comprehensive list of “technical challenge elements” that it expected to be particularly, you know, challenging. Six months ago, 11 teams and their robots took on the NIOSH research mine in the Tunnel Circuit of the DARPA Subterranean Challenge.

Challenge Schedule. The DARPA Subterranean or “SubT” Challenge seeks novel approaches to rapidly map, navigate, and search underground environments during time-sensitive combat operations or disaster response scenarios. “Teams are under tremendous pressure in the SubT Challenge, not just because of the prize money at stake, but because of the significance of winning a DARPA Grand Challenge, events that have a history of jumpstarting innovation,” said Dr. Timothy Chung, program manager for the Subterranean Challenge in DARPA’s Tactical Technology Office.. “At the core of the SubT Challenge is … DARPA Subterranean Challenge Teams Teams can compete in one or both of the research competitions: the Systems Competition and/or the Virtual Competition.