A team from the University of Illinois and the Beckman Institute took home the Bronze Medal at the Star Challenge multimedia search competition in Singapore last week.

The student team, led by Beckman Institute researchers Thomas Huang and Mark Hasegawa-Johnson, advanced through qualifying rounds beginning in June to reach the Grand Finals of Star Challenge 2008, an international competition to “build the next generation of multimedia search engines.” The Illinois team, called UIUC-YX, was made up of faculty members Huang and Hasegawa-Johnson, their postdocs and students, and was led by graduate student Yuxiao Hu.

Star Challenge was sponsored by the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) in Singapore. It began with 56 teams from 17 countries and ended in the five-team competition, won by a team from Singapore. The Illinois entry was the only team from the United States to reach the finals.