MIEM TechnoShow: ‘The University’s Key Objective is to Inspire Students to Create Something New’

AR-Navigation in the Building, Pavel Samoylenko’s project

With five hours of networking, 22 ‘video guest halls’, and over 800 visitors from 16 countries, this year’s MIEM TechnoShow was a spectacular online exhibition. Attendees could visit various ‘rooms’ to see the projects MIEM students had been working on this past academic year.

Special for the event, an innovative integrated platform was developed so that students could communicate with each other directly, ask questions, share their expert opinions, and get a deeper understanding of project details. Using a simple and user-friendly navigation tool, participants could easily move from ‘room’ to ‘room’ by entering their login and password only once, without the interference of a moderator.

This was possible thanks to MIEM’s existing digital infrastructure. Incidentally, two guest halls brought together five projects that were devoted to the development of MIEM’s own digital and video services.

A special feature of the event was an appearance by HSE Rector Kuzminov. He, along with other MIEM and HSE leaders, made rounds (or ‘quarantine rounds’) to all the rooms.

‘It is great to see students enthusiastically participating in these projects who are not required to — beginning students, undergraduate seniors, and even doctoral students,’ said Yaroslav Kuzmonov. ‘The university’s key objective is to inspire students to create something new regardless of whether they get a good mark or an official credit for the course.’

HSE MIEM Director and Academic Supervisor Evgenii Krouk confesses that because of the pandemic they had ‘a cowardly idea to put off the project defenses or give them credit as they were, in their unfinished form.’ ‘We decided against it because it would set us back a few years. It’s like in road racing: when a seasoned cyclist sees an obstruction on the road, they accelerate, since they know that the others will get frightened and slow down. We didn’t slow down. This is HSE’s strategy: a challenge makes you move faster.’

The most accomplished hardware and software projects were presented in the first part of the stream during the main online broadcasting. Neither the showroom nor the Rector’s visit interrupted the presentations. Students spoke about their projects and gave first-years and high school students advice on how to search for interesting project ideas and what to pay attention to at the beginning of the project.

Here is what some of the project leaders say about their projects, teamwork, and the invaluable experience they gained

Grigory Khromov, third-year student, Bachelor’s Programme ‘Information Science and Computation Technology’
Project: ‘Virtual Satellite Digital Laboratory’

Our project not only helped us gain invaluable experience with working in a team, planning, and coordinating our activities, but gave us insight into how a small spacecraft operates.

It was very helpful to learn in practice what terms of reference, deadlines and poster sessions are like and how to negotiate with customers and present your project. Among the drawbacks, I would cite the excessive number of reporting documents we had prepare, which took a great deal of time.

Sergey Kuznetsov, third-year student, Bachelor’s Programme ‘Applied Mathematics’
Project: ‘Analysis of Quantum Algorithm Implementation Methods’

I have been participating in projects since my second year: I assisted in arranging math clubs for high schoolers and I studied the basics of quantum mechanics. Project work allows me to put what I’ve learned from lectures and seminars into practice and try my hand at real tasks.

A few months ago, I took part in the Armensky Conference to present my research on Dicke quantum states. I think that this research, most of which was conducted in a project format, has been the most interesting experience in my project and scientific career—I immersed myself in my favorite areas of mathematics, computer science and physics and I managed to come up with some new findings.

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Large-scale projects take a lot of time and effort. This is certainly their main disadvantage, as they leave hardly any time for schoolwork, let alone for other things. But this can be their key advantage as well, because while working on a high-quality project, thinking over and refining its details, you gain experience in applying what you’ve already learned and learning new things, too.

For someone who is new to this kind of project work, the most important thing is to not give up. Sometimes it seems like you are getting nowhere. Even the greatest scientists get this feeling, which, for example, Richard Feynman has mentioned more than once. What would you expect from those who are just trying their hand at scientific research? You need to be prepared to resist pessimistic thoughts and push forward despite all odds.

Yana Dubilier, fourth-year student, Bachelor’s Programme ‘Information and Communication Technologies and Systems’
Project: ‘Metering Device Design Tool Library’

It took me a while to make up my mind about what project to do. Eventually, I chose this one, because I understood every word in the project title and because the project was led by Maria Krasivskaya. She is a reliable and approachable person, always ready to answer any of my questions and help me. On the face of it, our project seems the least conspicuous compared to the others, which appear to be so ambitious and global in scope. Yet, we can help students learn every detail about the configuration and performance of electric measuring devices. Users can assemble a device by applying ready-made templates, subprograms, and graphic interface elements of our tool library like pieces of a puzzle coming together. Our project is particularly relevant for this current situation the world has found itself in, as our design can be easily used in distance learning.

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The project helped me learn a lot about all basic structures such as Case Structure, For Loop, Flat Sequence Structure, and others. I understand their functions and the functions of all terminals for connection. I now know much more about electrical measuring devices, their design, and their features. I would certainly like to round out and expand this project so that it can be used in the future.

I think that projects help you learn more about your area of specialization and allow you to better understand whether you really like what you are doing or if you should apply yourself to something a bit different.

A big drawback we encountered in the course of our work was that we could only implement our project while working together in person on campus. We couldn’t work separately, since the application development framework does not let several people work on the same material simultaneously. At the same time, all subprograms are interconnected and have to be compatible with one another. We had to redesign and refine numerous things while working on the project.

Pavel Samoylenko, third-year student, Bachelor’s Programme ‘Applied Mathematics’
Project: ‘Indoor AR-Navigation’

Modern smartphones come with good cameras and are capable of supporting the latest augmented reality technology. We have used these features to make it easier for visitors to find their way around MIEM. AR-navigation is replacing ordinary 2D maps, so our team has designed a new map for the MIEM building. Most of the team didn’t have any experience in designing these kinds of apps before the project, so we are really grateful to our project supervisor Alexey Rolich for believing in us. He suggested this idea and during these eight months, he shared his expertise, gave useful advice, introduced us to the right people, and provided resource support, including necessary equipment for the MIEM 3D-Visualization and Computer Graphics laboratory.

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The first difficulty we faced while developing the application was the problem of the user’s local positioning. Inside a building, it is impossible to locate the position of a smartphone with a satisfactory degree of accuracy by using GPS or Glonass. Moreover, any AR application requires not only X, Y, and Z coordinates, but also a perfect spatial orientation of the device. To put it simply, the smartphone has to know which way it ‘is looking’. We’ve solved this problem by scanning lecture room door placards. While scanning the door placards, we added information about the course timetables for each particular room. On top of navigation options, the application can also visualize any content, including 3D content, in augmented reality.

We have developed a library of 3D models for this particular purpose—you just need to locate them inside the 3D model of the building and they will appear in the right place, just like in Pokemon Go. This application can be used not only as a game, but also for educational and creative purposes—it is to some extent reminiscent of the HSE server in Minecraft, but in augmented reality. The application is not available to the public, as the MIEM building is temporary closed and the testing has been put on hold. We hope that the building will open soon and that we’ll be able to launch our application in the near future. It won’t be easy to adjust the application so that it can be used in other HSE buildings. We are planning to begin with the Pokrovka building. We will have to develop additional algorithms for positioning, which include more complex technologies, such as Spatial Computing, Point Cloud, and Spatial Mapping. We are looking forward to this new challenge, because, for us, this will mean new knowledge, new experience, and an opportunity to prove ourselves and contribute to HSE University.

The HSE News Service thanks Polina Podkopaeva and Valeria Nemna for their assistance in preparing this article.