Robotics competitions and courses

Sounds like it is competition season again.

• UAV outback challenge where an unmanned ariel vehicle needs to find a person and drop supplies off to them. Registrations are due on the 27th September!
  
• NASA Sample Return Centennial Challenge, a 1.5 million dollar prize competition to have robots autonomously explore a region, collect samples, and bring them back to base. Registration due in January, with the competition set for June. Only 8 months before the deadline when they announced the competition details - what are they thinking?
  
• The ICRA solutions in perception challenge (May 2012), this doesn't seem too difficult - Identify and classify a set of objects, where you are given some training data/time. Use any sensor(s) you like.
  
• Australian CiSRA ExtremeImaging competition an interesting computer-photography competition, due October this year, finals in November.
  

Many more are listed at the robot contests and competitions FAQ. To get you up to speed with robotics, there are some great free courses being run. The stanford Machine Learning course and the Introduction to AI class are both free to register, and start now! The ESA summer of code in space already started last month, but it is worth keeping an eye on for next time.