UTEC students win 3rd place at the Regional Scientific Article Contest

Students María Guadalupe Noriega and José Álvaro Dasso, both just 18 years old, and currently 4th semester students at Universidad de Ingeniería & Tecnología (UTEC), took third place at the Regional Student Scientific Article Contest for all of Latin American and the Caribbean, organized by the  Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the largest professional association in the world dedicated to fostering the advancement of technological innovation for the benefit of humanity.The Peruvian duo participated with a research project prepared entirely in the English language, on the topic of “Comparison of standard methods of estimating movement in Digital Videos”, among a total of 17 academic papers evaluated in the contest, 4 of which discussed topics in communications, 3 in computer science, 2 in electricity and 7 in electronics.  With their scientific essay, the UTEC students seek to demonstrate that the accuracy and scope of the standard methods used to estimate movement when applied to noisy and low resolution digital videos, such as for example the ultrasound videos used in medicine. These results will later be used to observe the scope of new methods being developed at UTEC by the National Innovation Program for Competitiveness and Productivity of Peru, under Contract 148- FINCyT-IB-2013."This is a bit surreal, given that these students are only in their 4th semester of college studies and there is little doubt that they were competing against more senior students in the final semesters of their academic programs, who are traditionally the ones who write this type of research paper. The document was prepared by María Guadalupe and José Álvaro and the topic they chose to present was the very same one that they had been working on and learning in a project that I am developing for FINCyT, (Fund for Innovation, Science and Technology) which seeks to find a new fast, effective and accurate method to estimate movement in complex digital videos such as ultrasound videos that film plaque formation in the carotid artery", says Victor Murray, chief researcher of the project and Director of Electronics Department at UTEC.The objective of this contest is to provide young students with the opportunity to showcase their technical skills and present their work at an international level. The work submitted to this contest may be original individual and/or independent projects, university projects or even the work from a final semester academic program paper or thesis. Regardless of the work presented, the essays must be technical in nature and must discuss the technological developments or applications in the fields of electricity, electronics, information technology, communications, bio-engineering or any other related field.  The projects submitted were evaluated by three independent judges, specialists in the relevant subject matter; and the criteria applied in their careful examination of the papers were:  Topic Relevancy, Originality, Technical Accuracy and Clarity of the Presentation. The participation of UTEC students in this contest was made possible thanks to the IEEE-UTEC Student Branch which was launched in December of last year. About IEEEIEEE is the largest technical and professional society in the world devoted to advancing innovation and technological excellence, publishing over 30% of all research in the fields of electrical engineering, information technology, telecommunications and control technology. Its mission is to promote creativity, development and integration, to share and apply advancements in information technology, electronics and the sciences in general for the benefit of humanity and the professionals themselves.