University of Maryland students Zachary Lawrence, Andres Toro and Joshua Drubin demonstrate their trash can that sorts recyclable items from nonrecyclable items. Their GreenCan won first place in the University of Michigan’s 36-hour-long hackathon. 

Some university hackers went to The Big House this weekend. But there were no handcuffs, guards or wardens — instead, there were scouts from global engineering firms, watching students code, build and wire their way for more than $40,000 in prizes at MHacks.

More than 1,200 student hackers from around the world traveled to Ann Arbor, Mich., by the busload for the University of Michigan-hosted event. MHacks paid for the transportation and meals, but in exchange, participants had 36 hours to build a hack — an innovative form of technology using code or electronics — for more than 30 sponsors.

Those 36 hours were spent working in the luxury seating of The Big House, Michigan’s stadium. In groups capped at four members, students shared the pride, power and sometimes disappointment that come with hackathons.

“MHacks set out to be the largest student hackathon attempted, at the biggest venue we could get,” said Harry Hantman, a Michigan senior and MHacks volunteer with Michigan Hackers. “We wanted to attract the top hackers from across the country to compete by creating their own software or hardware projects from scratch over the course of the weekend.”

Michigan Hackers and MPowered Entrepreneurship, two University of Michigan student organizations, led the event. However, 80 students from this university took a 10-hour bus ride to Ann Arbor with the second largest group of students in attendance behind Purdue University.

And the trip was worth it when a team from this university took home several prizes, including the top prize of $6,000 from Hearst Automotive, and honorable mentions in other categories.

“We just totally destroyed at MHacks,” said Shariq Hashme, a junior computer science and electrical engineering major and the founder of Terrapin Hackers.

Hashme’s team encountered several problems during the event with their hack, a smart watch that could log exercise data. At one point, they had to get in touch with the owner of a multimillion-dollar company for access to a sensor, and the team lost all of its code 10 minutes before the competition ended.

But in the last moments of the hackathon, Hashme’s teammates were able to write the code that took them 36 hours to build in time for the judges.

The hacks ranged from a Google Glass app for people falling asleep while driving, to an app for summarizing movies and books, to a car model recognition app.

Evan Wang, a junior computer science major, was a part of the team from this university who helped build the car app. Hearst Automotive awarded his team an honorable mention.

“It didn’t go as smoothly as it could have,” Wang said of how time constraints affected the quality of their finished product.

The winning team, which was awarded the top prize of $6,000, created GreenCan, a sorting trash can. Based on the frequency of the sound of the trash as it hits inside, the device senses whether the item is recyclable and sorts it accordingly. The team, consisting entirely of students from this university, included sophomore computer engineering major Zachary Lawrence, sophomore computer engineering major Andres Toro and sophomore electrical engineering major Joshua Drubin.

Wang said he enjoyed the event because of the low-pressure atmosphere. The sponsors at the event, including Facebook, Google and Amazon, came to scout the top talent in programming while sending engineers from their companies around to assist teams. They also provided merchandise for the hackers, including T-shirts, stickers and water bottles.

“The event itself was chilling out with other hackers and coding what you’re working on, with a few hours of sleep,” he said.

Hashme noted that the sponsors, especially the engineers, were very interested in learning more about the projects students were working on, and many offered internships.

Wang was accustomed to this environment, as he regularly attends events held by Terrapin Hackers, such as Wednesday hack nights, which Wang called “mini-hackathons.”

Terrapin Hackers, which has an informal structure with no members or applications for admittance, organizes Maryland’s trip to hackathons and other events.

“We learn how to make stuff with technology and hope people find that passion within them,” Hashme said.

Computer science whizzes can relive the madness of this past weekend with HackMIT, another hackathon taking place at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. HackMIT is providing up to $200 per person in travel reimbursements.

HackMIT will likely not beat the attendance record set by MHacks, Hashme said, but students that represented the school last weekend will hopefully keep up appearances once again.

“I had the most fun just because of the crowd around me, your friends around you, hacking all night,” Wang said.