Do you know that smart sneakers are already a reality, electricity can be obtained from the mud in the nearest puddle, and a cart in Auchan can have artificial intelligence and answer questions? These are what about pupils told in MEPhI from the 1st to the 3rd of February at the All-Russian competition of pupils’ scientific works "Junior". To participate in the competition, pupils of 9-11 grades performed engineering research work within the listed sections (physics and astronomy; mathematics; biology and ecology; chemistry; computer science; robotics) and submitted abstracts to the organizing committee.
This year, works came from 35 subjects of the Russian Federation: from Kaliningrad to Krasnoyarsk, from Murmansk to Sochi and Crimea, as well as from Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Belarus. 301 projects out of 548 submitted were selected for the final of the competition (in 2018, 245 projects out of 469 submitted). This indicates a significant increase in interest in the competition and increase in the level of submitted projects.
In the welcoming speech, the rector of MEPhI M.N. Strikhanov stressed the importance of the competition, in particular project activities. "You are the representatives of the generation that will determine how our country and the world will develop. In addition to knowledge of the subject, it is necessary to know the related disciplines, constantly improve, learn several languages," Mikhail Nikolaevich addressed the pupils. Junior is a national platform for selection for the international competition of scientific and engineering creativity of students Intel ISEF, which annually attracts more than 2 thousand students from more than 100 countries. Every year 6-7 Junior contest winners are included in the Russian team at Intel ISEF. For 21 years of participation in Intel ISEF juniors won 87 awards. At the end of the speech, the rector wished the participants to work successfully, win and enter the leading universities of Russia and the world.
On behalf of the State Corporation "Rosatom", parting words to contest participants were said by the head of educational programs of the Rosatom Unit for innovation management P.V. Sushkov: "Rosatom is a knowledge corporation, and this means that this is the key, and the result of our success both in the past and in the present and future. That is why it is so important for us that new minds and restless hearts come to the world of physics and engineering." According to Pavel Vladimirovich, Junior is the best tool that leads to science and helps to better understand your interests and motivation. "I wish you fruitful work, new ideas, bright impressions, interesting meetings and all the best," P.V. Sushkov addressed the participants.
A well-known manufacturer of software products – 1C company – is the long-term sponsor of the contest. The Head of the Federal project 1C-programmers club N.V. Semenova noted that the competition was always in the focus of special attention: "This is the best project Olympiad for pupils. And projects are important not only in science but also in business. It is important to be able to work in a team, to interact with each other. Participate, gain experience, discover new opportunities, look for yourself and, of course, win.”
In addition to Rosatom, the competition is supported by a number of large corporations, including JSC "Roselectronics". The Director of external communications of JSC "Roselectronics" A.V. Brykin stressed that in the future it was important for pupils to make the right conclusions for the development in a professional way: "I hope that you will connect your life with professional activities in Russia. It is important, necessary, interesting and informative." Arseniy Valerievich wished the children success in the competition and professional victories in cooperation with key employers representing the leaders of the high-tech sector of the Russian economy – Rosatom, Roscosmos, Rostec and Roselectronics.
This year the competition is 22 years old. There are a lot of glorious pages in the history of Junior. The permanent head of competition jury, the head of Department of Informatics and processes of management, Professor Modyaev told about traditions and criteria of projects assessment. "The project is the result of your intellectual activity, and we examine it from the standpoint of the need to solve the problem, the relevance of the formulation, the novelty of the proposed solutions, the amount of work performed to implement the project, how experimental facilities and computer technology were used in the processing of the interpretation of the results, the preparation of the presentation."
The guys have defended their projects before a jury, which traditionally included not only representatives of MEPhI, but also the leading Moscow universities, and employees of the Russian Academy of Sciences. This allowed to objectively, comprehensively and professionally assess the work of students.
The level of projects was very high, which indicates the growing interest of Russian youth in engineering. For example, students of the 10th grade of the MEPhI Pre-university Maxim Levkin and Alexander Pinchuk presented the project "BiGiPiS" - smart sneakers and a mobile application. The goal is to simplify and secure navigation on the ground without the use of distracting devices. The principle of shoes is very simple: if you need to turn left, the left sneaker vibrates, if right – right. It allows not to freeze hands in the cold while holding the phone, and to be in the trend.
Under the guidance of researchers from ICIS MEPhI 11th grade students Natalia Ivleeva and Inna Larina completed the project "Multifunctional orientation system", which helps a blind or visually impaired person to orient and navigate in an unfamiliar space, to identify the surrounding objects, to get to the destination.
A student of the 11th grade of the school №1533 Peter Shumnov told why he had created a smart arranger: "The aim of my project was to create an application that would allow guitarists to automatically generate accompaniment to their parties. With it, the musician can create different arrangements of his song by pressing just a couple of buttons. Machine learning methods were used to solve the problem. This makes this project stand out from its peers, as it allows us to teach the program to compose parts for any instrument in any genre."
The winners and prize-winners of the competition were congratulated and awarded with diplomas, prizes and certificates by the heads of the Institutes of MEPhI, as well as the partners of the competition.
It should be noted that the contest "Junior" is included in the list of school Olympiads of 2018-2019 academic year, so the winners will be able to receive significant benefits for admission to universities of the Russian Federation.
Following the results, the organizing committee of the competition determined the Russian team for the international competition of engineering creativity of students Intel ISEF (May 12-17, 2019, the USA). It includes: Natalia Ivleeva and Inna Larina (Moscow, Lyceum №1511 of MEPhI Preuniversity); Yury Batrakov and Ivan Maraev (Moscow, Lyceum №1511 of MEPhI Pre-university); Igor Mezentsev (Moscow, School named after Marshal Chuikov); Michail Boim and Vasiliy Miturich (Moscow, School named after Marshal Chuikov).
