July 28 – Three 18-year-old Roman teenagers are now world champions in programming robot soccer players. Davide Aloisi, Lorenzo Di Donato and Simone Petrangeli, recent graduates of the Industrial Technical Institute Galilei in Rome and members of the SPQR Team, won first place at RoboCup Junior in the Soccer Open Weight Secondary category. The coach, Paolo Torda, was extremely pleased with the results. In Joao Pessoa, Brazil, 24 teams from 15 countries, six of which from Europe, competed in the category. Italy was represented by the winning ITIS Galilei in Rome and the Marconi New Football Team in Domodossola. “Our team was founded in 2011 – say the champions – when our computer teacher asked us if we wanted to take a course in robotics. In our team there are no leaders: Davide is a software engineer, Lorenzo is primarily concerned with hardware, much like a mechanical engineer, and Simone collects and draws up the scientific literature.” The SPQR Team had already won the RomeCup and reached third place in the Space Apps Challenge by NASA.
