Student Programs

Simulink Student Challenge Winners

MathWorks announces the winners of the 2014 Simulink Student Challenge. Congratulations and thanks to all the students who entered.

First Place (tie)

Autonomous Close Formation Flight

Daniel Wilson - The University of Sydney

This UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) project focused on the effect of Simulink and Model-Based Design on close formation flight. The student addressed a real-life problem, mid-air docking between two UAVs. The beauty of the Model-Based Design allowed him to quickly extend one UAV model to a two UAV formation flight model. The code generation was the highlight of his project which allowed him to implement the Simulink design directly, without rewriting the code. It showed a promising result and the video was well presented and demonstrated the power of Simulink.


First Place (tie)

Haptic Billiards

Colin Gallacher - McGill University

The Haptic Billiards project is a very creative utilization of MATLAB and Simulink for creating a full-fledged implementation of a video game using Haptic feedback. It also shows the effective use of Real-Time Windows Target and S-function based modelling. The video is well designed, has a good amount of detail, and a clear explanation of the implementation. Innovative design is the major highlight of the project. The results are very convincing and the video is a great combination of technical detail and creative visuals.


Third Place

Vehicle Dynamic Controls for an Electric Racecar

Global Formula Racing – DHBW, Ravensburg Campus

This project demonstrates real-time implementation of traction control, torque vectoring, and regenerative braking in a Formula Student car. CAN (controller area network) objects over wireless channels are used to communicate with the car while it’s running on the track. The project also shows how Simulink can be used in an efficient way in real-time situations, without the need to use embedded code on hardware targets. The video is excellent, shows the implementation of the design, the Simulink models used, and the final results in a very creative manner. This project shows successful completion of a technically challenging problem with the help of Simulink.