The “CHAOS” team from the School of Chemical Engineering at the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) in Greece has secured the first-place prize at the annual global Chem-E-Car Competition.
The event took place in Boston, USA, on November 2, 2025, as part of the prestigious 2025 American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Annual Meeting, a conference held annually in the United States.
Record precision wins team from Greece first place at Chem-E-Car Competition
Competing against 53 teams from around the world, the NTUA team achieved a spectacular performance with their chemically or electrically powered miniature vehicle, known as a “chem-e-car.”
The competition requires teams to design a small car that must travel a pre-determined distance without external intervention. The NTUA vehicle successfully traversed the required distance of 19.54 meters with an astonishing deviation of only 0.04 meters (4 centimeters), securing the global title.
The educational challenge
The Chem-E-Car Competition is highly educational, focusing on developing students’ skills in experimentation, design, and precision. As explained by NTUA School of Chemical Engineering Professor Athanasios Papathanasiou, the competition’s core goal is to teach students the value of measurable results and experimental accuracy.
“Participants are tasked with building a small car that must stop precisely at the finish line, which is anywhere from 15 to 30 meters from the start,” Professor Papathanasiou told protothema.gr. “The precise distance is disclosed only one hour before the race, significantly increasing the degree of difficulty.”
High-stakes rules
Under the rules, the vehicle must be powered by an energy source entirely designed by the students—typically a battery or a chemical reaction that produces a propellant gas. The contest’s unique challenge lies in the restrictions:
- No external control: Teams may not use brakes, remote control, or measure time or distance during the run.
- Self-stop mechanism: The car must stop on its own, either when its designed energy source is depleted or when a chemical or electronic control mechanism is activated.
The competition is intensely challenging, attracting approximately fifty universities each year, with forty typically hailing from the US and the remainder representing global institutions. Teams reaching the international final in Boston have first qualified through competitive regional events held in the spring.
The final competition is a highlight of the AIChE Annual Meeting, which brings together up to 5,000 participants from the field of chemical engineering, ensuring a high level of visibility and recognition for the winning team.
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