Project completed on January 21, 2023
“Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.”
— Steve Jobs
Inspired by the belief that design is defined by its functionality and not the other way around, we were selected to represent our school in the UAE STREAM Contraption Challenge. We joined this challenge before creating Dateel, and it was here that I formed lasting friendships.
For the challenge, we made Bioplex, a sustainable theme park; imagine a giant interactive Rube Goldberg machine where each ride and attraction seamlessly transfers energy to the next. Energy generated by solar panels is used to lift the roller coaster, the backbone of the park. The potential energy lost as the roller coaster runs is regained using regenerative braking that powers pumps that lift water for the water slide. The carousel is powered by wind turbines.
We worked on Bioplex almost every day for over half a year. We worked during school, after school, and at home on our own. You could find me working on Bioplex at 1am. We learned a lot of things working together; my friends taught me how to solder (not that any of us were particularly good at it), while I taught them how to use a breadboard and form working circuits. We used these skills later on in our school projects and surprised our teachers with our level of skill.
We shared tasks and roles, but I was mainly recognized for the programming in the project. I programmed an autonomous vehicle using an Arduino that used color sensors to activate the rides in the theme park. I also programmed the rest of Bioplex, which is fully autonomous with sensors and motors and controlled by another microcontroller.
Following our victory at the UAE STREAM Contraption Challenge, our team continued to innovate and collaborate on many projects. Bringing our spirit of Bioplex into each new endeavor was certainly challenging, but that spirit of Bioplex—our passion for sustainable design and our dedication to the team approach—was the heartbeat of everything we did. The competition didn’t end our journey, it was the start of a journey in creativity and engineering, one that would push us to keep pushing the limits of what we could do together.
