Carnegie Mellon U. hosts robot soccer

PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Carnegie Mellon University didn't just host the first American Open of robot soccer, its teams dominated the competition, taking two of three titles Sunday.
Sunday's games, featuring teams from Mexico, Canada, Iran and China, served as a warm-up to the international RoboCup 2003, which will be held in Padua, Italy, in July. Although the first RoboCup was held in 1997 and featured just a handful of teams, the competition in Italy is expected draw up to 300 entries, Veloso said.
The robots are programmed to react to thousands of possible game scenarios and communicate with each other about where the ball is and what strategy to employ.