The competition SCUDEM VII 2022 took place remotely from October 21 to November 13, 2022. Alexander Proshichev, Elena Naidenova, and Egor Shushkov, 2nd-year students of the Faculty of Computer Science and Technology of LETI, took part in it and received the Outstanding Award of the competition for the description of mathematical models based on differential equations.
A total of 366 students from 46 countries participated in the competition, divided into 142 teams. Each team was given a problem in one of three profiles: chemistry, physics, or sociology. Students had to choose a major and, after receiving the task, had three weeks to find a solution using differential equation modeling and give a 10-minute video presentation.
Of the three problems offered, the LETI students chose the physics task because it was closest to their major, “Applied Mathematics and Computer Science.” The program aims to train specialists in developing artificial intelligence models. As part of the competition, the team had to build a model of a fish’s mouth as it eats by sucking in food.
The students took the task and the presentation seriously. To shoot a beautiful and detailed video, they turned to the staff of the interactive video recording studio at LETI. Using an interactive whiteboard and professional equipment, the students shot the video and thus managed to stand out among the other teams. The LETI students’ final video is available on the university’s RuTube channel.
“The hardest part of this competition is the modeling itself. The task is not an academic one that has any particular answer. It is impossible to create a perfect model. We had to allocate time correctly to make a sufficiently accurate structure, gather all the material in one place, organize it conveniently, translate it into English, and record a 10-minute video presentation. We looked at several dozen scholarly foreign articles and went through about 6-7 different models. In the end, the best solutions were taken from each variant and arranged into one mathematical structure.”
Alexander Proshichev, a 2nd-year student of the Faculty of Computer Science and Technology of LETI
109 teams presented the final video to a panel of judges. The judges were 296 volunteer teachers and industry professionals divided into 37 judging teams who provided team scores, feedback, and constructive comments to the students.
The judges praised the work of the LETI team, with five of the eight judges awarding the highest score. The team received 4.25 out of a possible 5 points based on the results of eight reviews. The project was among the top 30 in the competition and the top 3 of 20 projects presented in the physics section.
The judges noted that the students did an excellent job with the presentation and modeling. They praised them for their use of graphics, which allowed them to clearly present the mathematical model they had developed, and also advised them to develop this topic further by making some aspects of the solution more transparent.
The SCUDEM VII 2022 competition was organized by the SIMIODE community, which brings together teachers and students working on methods for solving differential equations using simulations.
