YOUNGSTOWN - Youngstown State University's robotics team, the Moon Miners, secured third place in the 2024 NASA Lunabotics Challenge, a national engineering competition. The event tasks college teams with designing autonomous robots capable of mining simulated lunar soil.

The Moon Miners also earned third place in the Autonomy category, receiving a $250 award and a plaque. They additionally placed third in Construction, which came with an additional $250 award and plaque. The team accumulated over 600 points during the competition.

The YSU team comprised seven students: six senior electrical engineering students and one sophomore. Their project budget was $5,500. In comparison, some other teams in the competition had 15 to 30 students from various engineering and graduate programs. These larger teams often operated with budgets ranging from $25,000 to $30,000, supported by major companies.

The Moon Miners constructed their robot using an inexpensive Arduino microcontroller and code created by students Ayomide Hector Olukoya and Austin Zeigler. Many other teams, and even NASA's rovers, often use more complex software for their robots.

Despite having fewer resources than some competitors, YSU performed well against larger and more funded teams, including Iowa State University.

Representatives from NASA, MIT, Collins Aerospace, Raytheon, and Pratt & Whitney observed the competition held at The Astronauts Memorial Foundation’s Center for Space Education at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida.

The Utah Student Robotics Club won the grand prize Artemis Award, used their robot to excavate simulated regolith, the loose, fragmented material found on the moon’s surface, and built a berm. The students, who competed against 37 other teams, won the grand prize for the first time in the Lunabotics Challenge.