Truong Minh Xuan Tung is the Monitor of the K25 EDC PNU class and Vice-Secretary of the Mechanical Engineering Union and has also been learning diligently how to build a smart robot. He developed his interest in robots when when he was young and did not hesitate to enrol in the DTU Faculty of Mechanical Engineering when he graduated from high school. Xuan Tung also comes from the countryside, from the Dien Tho commune in the town of Dien Ban, in Quang Nam province. His childhood living and educational deprivations did not deter him from developing his heart-felt ambition, and, in 2020, Xuan Tung was able to take part in automotive industry promotion events.
Xuan Tung took part in the promotion of the automotive industry in 2020
“When I was ten, I dreamt of owning a small Formula-One model race car, like the other children of my age,” remembers Xuan Tung. “Owning a small model race car was the dream any poor boy like myself, so, to buy one, I saved and saved until I had 215,000 VND in the smallest denominations. “When I arrived at the toy shop, I ransacked my pockets for my precious savings, but, however hard I looked, they were empty. I assumed that I’d dropped the money on the road so, in desparation, I went back to search, but never found it.”
The unrelenting regret at not being able to buy the model only fanned his continuing desire to get one. Ultimately, Xuan Tung decided to make a model himself, out of paper, bamboo and any other available materials. Then he started experimenting with creating rudimentary robots. Six years later, Xuan Tung took part in the 2017 Robodnic contest in Danang. Although he came away without a prize, the contest fueled Xuan Tung’s ambition to create even more flexible robots that met more and more complex requirements.
A love of research leads to the creation of practical products
After two years at DTU, Xuan Tung knows that his decision was the right one. After class, he spends much time coming up with ideas planning new real and realistic research projects, advanced robots and team-building.
Xuan Tung (extreme left) finishes in the top five of the 2020 “ASEAN Virtual Entrepreneurship Hackathon”
“Since I’ve started researching, I find learned many useful new things and acquired the appropriate soft skills to gradually broaden my knowledge,” explained Xuan Tung. “The Mechanical Engineering lecturers have always encouraged me to complete difficult projects and develop new ideas concerning the creation of innovative and useful products for community use.”
With the expert support of his highly-qualified expert mentors from the DTU Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, several of Xuan Tung’s projects have met with their highest appreciation. These include the design and manufacturing of air quality monitoring and improvement systems, the Zigbee-to-LoRa signal converter for wireless sensor networks, a warning system for wastewater treatment stations in Danang and a life-saving air chamber for fishermen.
Xuan Tung (utmost left) in the top five of the 2020 “ASEAN Virtual Entrepreneurship Hackathon”
Driven by his continuing passion for robot creation, Xuan Tung has been experimenting and developing more advanced flexible robots that can maneouvre at faster speed, pick up objects and bypass obstacles. The robots Xuan Tung and his teammates develop are all based on their specialized knowledge of the design and manufacture of circuitry and automatic programming, learned at DTU, and from special sources recommended by their lecturers.
Xuan Tung won first prize in the 2020 CDIO contest for circuit design and many other awards:
- First prize in the 2020 CDIO for circuit design, held by the DTU Faculty of Electrical Engineering
- First prize in the 2020 Warring Robots contest, held by the DTU Faculty of Electrical Engineering
- First prize at the 2021 DTU Student Scientific Research conference
- top five in the 2020 ASEAN Virtual Entrepreneurship Hackathon, jointly organized by DTU and the Universitas Islam in Indonesia
- Consolation prize in the 2020 Eureka Student Research contest, held by the HCMC Youth Union and the National University in HCMC
- Honored on the 71st anniversary of Vietnamese Students’ Day, on January 9, 2021.
Xuan Tung participates in many other extra-curricular activities at DTU, as well as the Green Summer campaigns and Electronic Doctors event. He also signs up to work with Union members in blood donations, the Green Sunday event and giving senior high school students conducted tours around the university.
“I use strict time management to balance my studying, researching, extracurricular activities and physical exercise, to obtain the most effiective results,” explained Xuan Tung. “Participating in charitable activities and helping people in difficult circumstances gives me extra motivation to study and research, with the intention of contributing my youthful energy to even more socially vital relevant activities in the near future.”
(Media Center)