Leaders of Team CajunBot and university officials lauded team members and sponsors during an awards ceremony at the Advanced Computer Technology and Research building on campus today.
The team most recently was one of 10 featured in the Discovery Science channel’s five-part series “Robocars.”
In 2004, 2005 and 2007, team members built two autonomous vehicles which competed in the Department of Defense’s challenges which pitted driverless vehicles against one another in on a desert course and city streets. The first two challenges featured CajunBot – a six-wheeled all-terrain vehicle. In 2007, team members showcased CajunBot II - a Jeep Wrangler Rubicon.
Awards were given out in three categories including:
Red Brass Team Members: Trouble Arnold, Adrian Aucoin Jr., Firas Bouz, Rochelle Brasseaux, Joshua Bridevaux, Charles Cavanaugh, Muralidar Chakravarthi, Ronald Cheek, Russ Danna, Adam Dupre, Daro Eghagha, Suresh Golconda, Dallas Griffith, Joshua Hargrave, John Herpin, Arun Pratap Indugula, Nitin Jyoti, Arun Lakhotia, Patrick Landry, Chris Ledet, Adam Lewis, Anthony Maida, Danny Majors, Mark McKelvy, Chris Meaux, Pablo Mejia, Christopher Mire, Santhosh Padmanabhan, Prashant Pathak, Amit Puntambekar, Jonathan Raush, Ryan Rucker, Gunasekaran Seetharaman, Mike Speers, Chandan Uddaraju, Christopher Vaughn, Vidhya Venkitakrishnan and Scott Wilson.
Red Brass Sponsors: U.S. National Wetlands Research Center, Hewlett-Packard, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Begnaud Manufacturing Inc., Broadpoint Inc., Pixus Digital Printing, Cain’s Auto Service, Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development, Honda of Lafayette, Cajun Off-Road, Espion International, SICK Inc., Ibeo Automobile Sensor GmbH, Iteris Inc., 2 the Max ATVs, Loretta Tauzin, Lark Chartier and Joey Pons.
Glass Awards: Lafayette Motors, Firefly Digital Inc., C&C Technologies, Brother Ray Majors, Quality Transport Inc., MedExpress Companies, Oxford Technical Solutions Ltd., Charles D. Cavanaugh and Arun Lakhotia.
Special MVP awards were given to Joshua Bridevaux, Pablo Mejia and Suresh Golconda. The “Hidden Hand” award was given to former UL Lafayette President Ray Authement.
“This team has done such outstanding work to have UL Lafayette counted amongst the elite engineering schools,” stated Arun Lakhotia, CajunBot's team leader. “They have worked incredibly hard, going 36 hours and even 50 hours without sleep. For the four years we have been going back to challenges, I didn’t have the time to look up and recognize their hard work. Now, it’s time to do that.”
