page_title: National Robotics Engineering Center
section_title: NREC History
hierarchical_section_title: National Robotics Engineering Center / NREC History
caption_attribution_description: Tartan Rescue's CHIMP robot cuts a triangle out of wallboard at the DARPA Robotics Challenge Trials in December 2013. [National Robotics Engineering Center]
context_page_description: The National Robotics Engineering Center is an operating unit within the Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon University. NREC works closely with government and industry clients to apply robotic technologies to real-world processes and products, including unmanned vehicle and platform design, autonomy, sensing and image processing, machine learning, manipulation, and human–robot interaction.
  NREC also works on STEM educational outreach through its Robotics Academy, which provides robotics curricula and software for K-12 and college-level students.
context_section_description: In 1994 the Field Robotics Center (FRC) scientists realized that mobile robotics was a mature enough field for commercial application in agriculture, construction, mining, utilities, and other markets. Consequently, NREC was chartered in that year, as the National Robotics Engineering Consortium, to develop and transition robotic technology to industry and federal agencies. Original funding for the center included a $3M grant from NASA.
  In 1996, the organization moved to its current facility in Pittsburgh’s Lawrenceville neighborhood and was renamed the National Robotics Engineering Center. NREC is housed in a renovated, 100-year-old foundry building on a reclaimed industrial brownfield site.
caption: Tartan Rescue's CHIMP cuts wallboard at the 2013 DARPA Robotics Challenge Trials
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