Platform for the development of mechatronic practical works based on LEGO Mindstorms NXT robots

“Mechatronic” is a term that is used for describe an integrating science of the mechanical, electronic and computers areas with the objective of generating intelligent mechanical products. This characteristic needs to be taken into account for choosing a working platform when practical works with students are developed. For this, in this paper a platform based on LEGO Mindstorms NXT is proposed. Since it is a very flexible, easy to use and powerful environment, many programming and robot control activities can be developed. This allows the implementation of different controllers, working with artificial vision algorithms and images treatment, movements planning, avoiding obstacles, etc.