‘Roboland’: Inside UNLV’s new robotics lab

By Ian Whitaker

Friday, April 24, 2015 | 2 a.m.

When you ask UNLV robotics professor Paul Oh how long his laboratory took to create, he can’t help but laugh.

Since October, he and a team of students have been moving equipment in and out of a large suite next to a 99 Cents Only store on Flamingo Road near UNLV. Thursday was the robotics lab’s grand opening to the public, but to him it’s still a work-in-progress.

“I like to tell people this is Phase 0.5,” he said. “By Phase 3, it will look like Tony Stark’s Iron Man lab.”

Half of the space is crammed with computers, wires and chainlink enclosures. Metal Rebel, UNLV’s entry into a prestigious robotics competition organized by the Department of Defense, hangs from a chain on a heavy-duty winch. Just a few feet away the lab floor fades into carpet and pristine new office cubicles that will hold future generations of robotics gurus.

Or at least Oh hopes.

“I have a five to ten year plan,” he said. “For now I’ve been calling it Roboland.”

Think Smithsonian meets Epcot Center meets Universal Studios, he said.

While Oh likes Southern Nevada’s new love affair with STEM programs, he dreams of a time when technology is just part of the background noise of living in Las Vegas.

A number of high-profile VIPs toured the lab Thursday — but they weren’t your typical troupe of governors, state senators and dignitaries. They are the CEOs of gaming corporations, healthcare providers and defense contractors — all people who have cash to sponsor Oh’s fledgling Drones and Autonomous Systems program.

Oh is the science equivalent of signing a star coach to lift a team to a national title. The university’s engineering program may not have the national name recognition it wants just yet, but with unique programs in unmanned aerial systems and now robotics, the former Drexel University professor thinks it can get there.

“The big question now is how are UNLV and the region going to leverage that?” he said. “There is enthusiasm in these students; They know they don’t have to leave the region anymore.”

When he came to UNLV late last year, Oh brought a team of highly-skilled researchers as well as millions in federal grants. The professor has worked at the National Science Foundation and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab, among other places. One of the reasons he was inspired to come to Nevada was because of its potential for becoming the center of the world for drone technology.

In June, Oh and his team of mostly mechanical engineering students will head to California to put their $750,000 robot through tasks like opening a door, turning a valve and maneuvering over rocky terrain at the national Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's robotics contest. The goal is to develop technology that can help first responders in emergency situations or in cleanup after disasters such as the nuclear plant meltdown in Fukushima, Japan.

Some of the students on the team followed Oh from Drexel. Others were born and raised in Las Vegas. But they all have one thing in common: they were hand picked.

Santiago Ricoy, 22, recently transferred from the College of Southern Nevada. He met Oh at a gathering of robotics enthusiasts and asked him if he needed help with anything. The students who work with Oh are driven, self-confident and above all, competent.

“It’s about how much you contribute,” Ricoy said. “It’s pretty exciting seeing how much I’ve been able to help with.”

In Oh’s team, grades and book smarts are not as important as problem-solving and critical thinking.

“We’re training students to think beyond just a competition and playing with robots,” Oh said. “I don’t think its a prideful or boastful thing to say we are world-class.”