MIT's Atlas robot opens the door

A close-up of MIT's robot hands

MIT's robot

The robot had to reset after failing the drill part of the course, but made it through in the end.

Team MIT

Engineers from MIT’s team watched on as Atlas attempted to drill a hole in the wall.

Germany's NimbRo Rescue

Germany’s team had seven of eight points after the first day, so it competed at the end of the day, right before the winners were announced.

Robot fall

NimbRo fell when it was trying to get through the rubble, and had a bit of trouble getting up.

CHIMP

Tartan Rescue, out of Carnegie Mellon University and the National Robotics Engineering Center, warmed up before its final run. It placed first, with all eight points in under an hour, the first day of the challenge.

Robot crash

CHIMP accidentally drove the Polaris into the barricade.

CHIMP in action

Robot shadows

CHIMP prepared for the drill task. Communication was degraded in the course, so the robots had to act autonomously for certain things.

Robot acrobatics

RoboSimian got out of the car and then did some crazy moves to stand on its head and go through the course.

RoboSimian enters the course

The crowd went wild as RoboSimian entered the course.

A robot prepares to rest and enter the course

RoboSimian tries to drill

Team WPI-CMU

The audience erupted as the Warner robot out of Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Carnegie Mellon University successfully exited the vehicle.

Opening the door

The first task was to open the door, which this robot did successfully.

Climbing over the rubble

At a fairly fast pace, WPI’s robot climbed over the cement rubble in the course.

WPI fans cheering for their robot

Programming the robots

Thousands of yards away, software teams worked to control the robot, though there were periodic blackouts while it was in the course to simulate a real-life disaster situation.

Robot jokes

Teams were having fun decorating their robots back in the garage where they stayed for the weekend.

A dancing, skating robot

This robot, from Robotis, and its caretaker, skated around the expo and danced for visitors.

Failed attempt

Team Aero out of the University of Tokyo attempted the surprise task, putting a cord into a hole.

Team AERO

Sadly, the robot dropped the cord. It only cried a little.

Team AERO watches on

A huge crowd

The DRC drew a huge crowd, who oohed and ahhed, laughed, and gasped watching robots try to go through the course.

Robot down

A robot fell after trying to get through the final part of the challenge, and the team had to pick it up, which meant they lost 10 minutes of time.

The course

There were four of these courses running simultaneously in the challenge.

Robots of all sizes

This demonstration shows how a tiny robot can gauge environmental conditions and report back to its momma robot.

NASA's robot

NASA showed off by making its robot dance.

Robotis mini robots

These robots danced to top 40 hits. It was perhaps more amazing than robots opening doors and climbing stairs.

Lego robots

There were hundreds of kids at the DRC, all excited about robots.

UNLV's Hubo

Hubo was out of University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Robot eyes

Working on the robots

Teams consistently worked on the tech behind the robots at their expo booths.

Robot excitement

A long week

The DRC teams had been in Pomona for a week, and the software teams virtually never slept, constantly updating code. This HKU team member took a break.

SRI humanoid robot

SRI demoed its humanoid robot, which it unveiled at the DRC. The battery for this guy lasts eight hours.

SRI robot hand

SRI is developing smart, affordable robot technology.

SRI's bomb technology

This robot out of SRI can take apart bombs remotely.

Taking apart the bomb

An SRI engineer demos how the robot could take apart a bomb.

SRI's military tech

These robotic leg supports allow soldiers to carry 150 pounds without hurting themselves.

Getting girls into robotics

There were many young girls at the DRC, interested in robots — which was really great to see, because there were almost none on the teams.

MIT's robot cheetah

MIT drew a huge crowd with its robot cheetah, which ran up and down the course, hopped, and danced.

Kids designed this robot game

Kids working on robot projects

Inside the garage with the teams

R2D2 look-alikes

A much needed nap