Chinemelu Ezeh

One modern phenomenon that has the capacity of boosting production as well as diminishes the human intervention in the production chain is robots. To the average Nigerian, robots are nothing but some mechanical configurations that are domiciled within the laboratory rooms used for experimentation. But this thinking appears obsolete as the modern engage in continual metamorphosis that seeks to further isolate the human person even when the final outcome of the efforts are geared towards enhancing the value of the collective comfort for the human race.

The study of robot in the field of engineering is simply defined as an integration of electronics, electrical, computing, mechanical and material engineering, dealing with designs, manufacturing and use of robots for control, sensory feedback and information processing.

In this advanced area of endeavour, robots have emerged as ‘rivals’ to human beings as far as undertaking of tasks are concerned as they can now replicate almost any form of human activity. For instance, they now popularly employed in danger prone endeavours such as bomb detection and de-activation of life-threatening activities.

Considering the level of development of Nigeria and lack of awareness amongst Nigerians, is it not therefore antithetical that a Nigerian is making wave in robotics in the United Kingdom?

Yes, a young Nigerian named Chinemelu Ezeh a force to be reckoned with in robotic engineering. Speaking on his experiences in Robotic engineering, Ezeh declared that he derives joy in a field that is seen as ‘potpourri’ as well as melting point of all engineering fields.

Armed with a three-year scholarship for a Doctorate Degree in Assistive Robotics from the University College London, he is currently working to develop novel control interfaces for sharing control between a wheelchair user and a smart wheelchair.

He warned against locating the reliance of Robotic engineering solely within the field of complicated engineering profession, saying that Robotic engineering finds expression in almost every field of endeavour.

His explanation: “Since Robotics is versatile, it finds applications is just about any field from finance, electrical to mobile to online e-commerce. The skills gained from studying Robotics are easily translatable to other fields and this opens up many doors anywhere, Nigeria included.”

While tracing how a Nigerian, who went to secondary in Nigeria can ‘suddenly’ develop such a knack for complicated area of study such as Robotics, his former Mathematics teacher at the Nigeria Tulip International School, Mr Sabri Unal, explained that Ezeh’s decision to study Robotics engineering did not come to as a surprise.

He hinted that Ezeh had a passion for computers while in secondary school which gave an indication of where his future in educational pursuit lies. He advocated freedom, encouragement and support for children to freely develop their innate talents while growing up, adding, “the potentials of children should never be underestimated either by their parents or teachers. It is very vital to give them a chance to explore these potentials in different areas, which would show what sectors they may be best suited for.”

Back in his secondary school days, Ezeh won awards after awards as they are going out of fashion. He bagged the 1st runner-up in Abuja, in both instances in the Junior and senior categories of the Cowbell Mathematics Competition, and later emerged as Bronze medalist, Infomatrix Computer Olympiad held in Romania in 2006. He also helped programme the robot for the project that won silver in the Informatrix competition. In 2007, he emerged Silver Medalist at the Science and English Fair, which took place in Turkey, while in 2008, he placed 7th place in the Nigerian National Mathematics Olympiad.

Again, he passed his WAEC/SSCE colours in 2008 with distinction and also scored 90 percent for his Advanced level studies at the Cambridge Arts and Science, Canterbury United Kingdom. Also, he was the only student that was accepted into the prestigious Imperial College London after emerging the best graduating student.

While school environment played a key role in the development of his engineering instinct, his parents also aided the development of the interest.Recalling with nostalgia how his father, an Engineer himself and a Food Scientist as his mother, an important role, he said: “My best subject, as far back as I can remember, was Mathematics, which is a core requirement for engineering. Also, throughout the years I find that there is a joy in creating things that have never been, and that is what engineers do.”

He credits his parents with a very hands-on approach to raising their children. “They were very serious about education and so would buy us many books and educational toys. We also had many lesson teachers from a young age. They also ensured we ate healthy and they did their best to ensure we grow up with a good sense of moral judgement and character based on the way they lived their own lives,” Ezeh added.

Going on to study Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the ICL between 2010-2014, where he also had a stint a Software Engineering (Trainees) in the London Geo team of Google, where he emerged with a First Class Honours.

In his first year at the ICL, he was team leader of a group that designed and constructed a track-completing robot using assembly language, while in his fourth year, he built a robot from the scratch to demonstrate a navigation system, and designed a navigation system by simulating optimal control for path following of differential drive for his thesis, which centered on Design and Implementation of Control and Path Planning of Autonomous Vehicle.

Following his achievements at the ICL, Ezeh was awarded a full three-year scholarship by University College London, where he is scheduled to round up later this year.

With the world at his feet as it were, Ezeh said his plans include returning to Nigeria to explore opportunities the country has to offer. But unlike his predecessors who got lost in the crowd and never made a headway upon their returning home, it appears Ezeh already has a compass with which to navigate the spirit of stifling of talents that is embedded in the Nigerian space, saying, “my plan for the future is to use technology to solve some of the major challenges in Africa. I believe technology can help improve literacy levels, facilitate transparency in government, solve our power crisis and improve the quality of life of people in Africa.”

The young Nigerians was amused that Nigeria and Africa by extension are yet to grab the opportunity offered by science and technology to solve the myriad of development challenges confronting the nation.

He lamented: “I am surprised we do not have science based television channels that inspire people into the field. The British and Americans have many of such programmes. We have to face reality: modern civilisation is founded on science and technology. There is no other way to develop a nation. As writer and former Colorado Governor Richard Lamm said, ‘All we know about the new economic world tells us that nations which train engineers will prevail over those which train lawyers. No nation has ever sued its way to greatness’.

“Nations advance when they apply principles gained from the pursuit of organised knowledge, which is essentially the scientific method of thinking. Technology is the fruit of scientific pursuit. I do stress the application because at the end of the day, action counts more than just words. As a nation, we need to become more curious in science and technology in order to catch up with the rest of the world similar to what India has done.”

With papers already published in academic journals, Ezeh is also President of the UCL Robotics Society, which he co-founded. But how and where did the inspiration to go into Robotics comes from?

He stated that his school, Nigeria Tulip International School, not only influenced his interest, but also assisted with developing a rigorous background in mathematics and science.

He added that the school encouraged willing students to broaden their horizon by participating in local and international competitions. “I gained an appreciation of science and technology through the international exposure providing by attending these competitions. Furthermore, during my holidays, I would stay back in school for advanced training in Mathematics, Physics and Informatics. It was a lot of fun because we would have a lot of social events when we were not hard at work. We studied hard and play hard,” he recalled.

Ezeh said plans are underway to sustain his success story with the establishment of an organization named ‘Impactionate Ltd’ where he is the Chief Executive Officer whose aim is to primarily focus on crowd-funding for sustainable developmental projects that can be measured.

He stressed that the firm, ‘Impactionate’ encapsulates his vision, saying, “Impactionate is a company born out of a desire to be the change I want to see.” A personal vision that could be transformed into a national vision that can drive the development of Nigeria may well be within sight.

https://guardian.ng/technology/nigerias-chinemelu-ezeh-on-global-stage-of-robotics/

Wailers on the rise everyday, God bless the God of Wailers

congrats bro

Ahead Ahead. Forward Ever, Backwards Never. proudly 5%

...let me wait for YORUBAS to come and give us their own version

Karlman:
...let me wait for YORUBAS to come and give us their own version

Yinmu, Yoruba Robotics engineers full ground brekete. Anyway, Good for him. But others have been doing it way before him and more are still doing it.

http://venturesafrica.com/at-this-nigerian-school-all-they-do-is-build-robots/

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2017/04/7-nigerian-students-fly-countrys-flag-first-global-robot-olympics/

http://www.blackenterprise.com/technology/nigerian-robotics-engineer-tech/

Congrats

FlyoruB:


Yinmu, Yoruba Robotics engineers full ground brekete. Anyway, Good for him. But others have been doing it way before him and more are still doing it.

http://venturesafrica.com/at-this-nigerian-school-all-they-do-is-build-robots/

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2017/04/7-nigerian-students-fly-countrys-flag-first-global-robot-olympics/

http://www.blackenterprise.com/technology/nigerian-robotics-engineer-tech/

SMH, we are talking about robot tech here not play toys

xharder:



SMH, we are talking about robot tech here not play toys

Ishola Babatunde Isaac is an Inventor, Roboticist, Researcher, Electrical Engineer, and Software developer. He obtained a BSc. Electronic and Electrical Engineer (First Class Honor) from Obafemi Awolowo University where as a student; he was part of the OAU iLab team – research collaboration between Massachusetts Institute of Technology and OAU developing remote online laboratories that serves a good substitute to the conventional laboratories.

He developed a system that allows students to control real laboratory equipment over the internet. The remote labs are a great substitute for experimentation in Nigerian university given the chronic underfunding of higher institutions of learning, we get to see about 10 students clustered around a piece of lab equipment. With the remote labs, this problem is eliminated as only one equipment is needed regardless the number of students as students only get to access the lab remotely (over the internet) but without the time and space restriction associated with the conventional labs. Babatunde has developed several remote and virtual laboratories currently being used by students of OAU, contributed software suite to ease development for the iLab development team and has trained several students and staffs of OAU, UI and Bells University.

As an emerging Roboticist, his research interest lies in the area of Robotic. You will probably never find a better robotics enthusiast in Nigeria though most of his works are independent robotics research. Leveraging on the Massive Open Online Course, he has learnt the basics of robotics systems since courses are not been offered on this subject in Nigeria Universities. He has since been part of a number of robot projects. These include a locally fabricated Humanoid (looks and walks like humans) robot; Autonomous rover (vehicle that drives itself using camera as input and Artificial Intelligence); Robotic Arm used in an automated remote laboratory for a civil engineering experiment. Robotics is a highly theoretical field and so he bridges the gap by taking advantage of the Massive Open Online Course to take courses in that domain.

As a member of the Student Platform for Engineering Education Development (SPEED) and so passionate about engineering education and eliminating mediocrity among the younger generations, He conducts robotics training (Lego Mind storm) for secondary school students teaching them how to build and program robots and prepare them to compete in the World Robotics Olympiad.

His interest lies in research and development – advancing the frontiers of knowledge while imparting lives; giving new hopes to those who has lost hope…He is also into some Brain Computer Interfacing projects in the Laboratory for Bioinstrumentation and Neuroengineering at Obafemi Awolowo University among which is a thought-controlled prostheses that could allow amputees control replacement limb with just their thought. Among milestone he has set to achieve is a thought-controlled car. Imagine people with disabled motor function being able to drive a car by just thinking.

Driven by similar motivation for rehabilitation technology, He has earlier designed a motion capture suit that could help Stroke patients in their recovery process. This was achieved by capturing the motion of wearer using motion sensors attached to the suit…the same technology could be used in animation industry (in place of Kinect) to capture an actor's motion and saved as a BVH, BIP or STP file for realistic animation, it’s indeed a much better solution than Kinect.

Alongside, he is a versatile software developer – a polyglot, with over a dozen programming languages to his credit. He develops software cutting across several platforms: web, desktop, mobiles, devices…He is on the team developing Africa’s first social job-site – insidify – a job and cv search platform for employers and job seekers. He is also the CTO of Arooko – an incredibly easy to use, offline platform for mobile phone recharge set to launch soon in Nigeria.

Ishola Babatunde sure has a few feathers to his hat. He won the Microsoft Nigeria’s Most Innovative Student Award during the Microsoft Imagine Cup Nigeria in 2011; Winner of the Education category of Samsung Apps Developers’ Content (2010) and came third overall in Nigeria. With such rare combination of a good academic standing and practical expertise, Babatunde is definitely an inspiration to many young engineering students. But when asked where he gets his inspiration, he simply has this to say "But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding”-job 32:8"

"My advice to students out there: push the limits; don’t be afraid to go the extra mile after all, only those who go too far can possibly know how far they can go"

"I look forward to developing robotic systems as solution to unique challenges being faced in Nigeria in areas as agriculture, medicine, rehabilitation among other. I am a firm believer that the problem being faced by a nation can only be solved effectively by resident of that nation as only they can fully experience in the unique challenges around"

"I do wish I had been introduced to robotics much earlier (like in secondary school) and so I am determined to help students in this category to have those things I wish I had"

Source: http://www.trezzyblog.com/2016/07/meet-nigerian-engineer-ishola-babatunde.html

xharder:



SMH, we are talking about robot tech here not play toys

I'm sure you didn't even go through those links else you wouldn't have made such an ignorant and foollish statement. Yorubas are already grooming an army of the next generation of robotics engineers while you are here talking crap just coz of one single person?? Smh.

FlyoruB:


Yinmu, Yoruba Robotics engineers full ground brekete. Anyway, Good for him. But others have been doing it way before him and more are still doing it.

http://venturesafrica.com/at-this-nigerian-school-all-they-do-is-build-robots/

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2017/04/7-nigerian-students-fly-countrys-flag-first-global-robot-olympics/

http://www.blackenterprise.com/technology/nigerian-robotics-engineer-tech/

I TALK AM!

FlyoruB:


Ishola Babatunde Isaac is an Inventor, Roboticist, Researcher, Electrical Engineer, and Software developer. He obtained a BSc. Electronic and Electrical Engineer (First Class Honor) from Obafemi Awolowo University where as a student; he was part of the OAU iLab team – research collaboration between Massachusetts Institute of Technology and OAU developing remote online laboratories that serves a good substitute to the conventional laboratories.

He developed a system that allows students to control real laboratory equipment over the internet. The remote labs are a great substitute for experimentation in Nigerian university given the chronic underfunding of higher institutions of learning, we get to see about 10 students clustered around a piece of lab equipment. With the remote labs, this problem is eliminated as only one equipment is needed regardless the number of students as students only get to access the lab remotely (over the internet) but without the time and space restriction associated with the conventional labs. Babatunde has developed several remote and virtual laboratories currently being used by students of OAU, contributed software suite to ease development for the iLab development team and has trained several students and staffs of OAU, UI and Bells University.

As an emerging Roboticist, his research interest lies in the area of Robotic. You will probably never find a better robotics enthusiast in Nigeria though most of his works are independent robotics research. Leveraging on the Massive Open Online Course, he has learnt the basics of robotics systems since courses are not been offered on this subject in Nigeria Universities. He has since been part of a number of robot projects. These include a locally fabricated Humanoid (looks and walks like humans) robot; Autonomous rover (vehicle that drives itself using camera as input and Artificial Intelligence); Robotic Arm used in an automated remote laboratory for a civil engineering experiment. Robotics is a highly theoretical field and so he bridges the gap by taking advantage of the Massive Open Online Course to take courses in that domain.

As a member of the Student Platform for Engineering Education Development (SPEED) and so passionate about engineering education and eliminating mediocrity among the younger generations, He conducts robotics training (Lego Mind storm) for secondary school students teaching them how to build and program robots and prepare them to compete in the World Robotics Olympiad.

His interest lies in research and development – advancing the frontiers of knowledge while imparting lives; giving new hopes to those who has lost hope…He is also into some Brain Computer Interfacing projects in the Laboratory for Bioinstrumentation and Neuroengineering at Obafemi Awolowo University among which is a thought-controlled prostheses that could allow amputees control replacement limb with just their thought. Among milestone he has set to achieve is a thought-controlled car. Imagine people with disabled motor function being able to drive a car by just thinking.

Driven by similar motivation for rehabilitation technology, He has earlier designed a motion capture suit that could help Stroke patients in their recovery process. This was achieved by capturing the motion of wearer using motion sensors attached to the suit…the same technology could be used in animation industry (in place of Kinect) to capture an actor's motion and saved as a BVH, BIP or STP file for realistic animation, it’s indeed a much better solution than Kinect.

Alongside, he is a versatile software developer – a polyglot, with over a dozen programming languages to his credit. He develops software cutting across several platforms: web, desktop, mobiles, devices…He is on the team developing Africa’s first social job-site – insidify – a job and cv search platform for employers and job seekers. He is also the CTO of Arooko – an incredibly easy to use, offline platform for mobile phone recharge set to launch soon in Nigeria.

Ishola Babatunde sure has a few feathers to his hat. He won the Microsoft Nigeria’s Most Innovative Student Award during the Microsoft Imagine Cup Nigeria in 2011; Winner of the Education category of Samsung Apps Developers’ Content (2010) and came third overall in Nigeria. With such rare combination of a good academic standing and practical expertise, Babatunde is definitely an inspiration to many young engineering students. But when asked where he gets his inspiration, he simply has this to say "But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding”-job 32:8"

"My advice to students out there: push the limits; don’t be afraid to go the extra mile after all, only those who go too far can possibly know how far they can go"

"I look forward to developing robotic systems as solution to unique challenges being faced in Nigeria in areas as agriculture, medicine, rehabilitation among other. I am a firm believer that the problem being faced by a nation can only be solved effectively by resident of that nation as only they can fully experience in the unique challenges around"

"I do wish I had been introduced to robotics much earlier (like in secondary school) and so I am determined to help students in this category to have those things I wish I had"

Source: http://www.trezzyblog.com/2016/07/meet-nigerian-engineer-ishola-babatunde.html

FlyoruB:


I'm sure you didn't even go through those links else you wouldn't have made such an ignorant and foollish statement. Yorubas are already grooming an army of the next generation of robotic engineers while you are here talking crap just coz of one single person?? Smh.

so if you have all this, why are you guys afraid of biafra and scared of staying on your own in oduduwa or in Nigeria?

xharder:



so if you have all this, why are you guys afraid of biafra and scared of staying on your own in oduduwa or in Nigeria?

Guy, are you ok at all?? What's robotics got to do with that crap you just wrote up there? Come, what is your obsession with Yoruba people sef? Do you people need Yoruba people's support, consent or validation to get your Biafra? Are we the ones holding you from getting Biafra?? Coz I don't get what this your rant is about.

....

xharder:


so if you have all this, why are you guys afraid of biafra and scared of staying on your own in oduduwa or in Nigeria?

You are the ones asking for Biafra but when your vagabond fathers were deported to Onitsha bridge by Fashola, you all cried like barren witches.
On the other hand, I am happy you know Yorubas are your gods in this country and they determine who you get, what you get and how you get it.

Karlman:
...let me wait for YORUBAS to come and give us their own version

Your low self-esteem is so evident that you subconsciously compare your best to the worst of the Yorubas.

xharder:


SMH, we are talking about robot tech here not play toys

The fact that you refer to those robotic devices as toys shows that you are mentally naked and an exception to commonsense.