Google's Johny Cab

Drawing on the immense computing power of Google's server farms, the search giant has been quietly testing  self driving cars with the aim of aiding mankind according to the Official Google Blog. 

According to the World Health Organization, more than 1.2 million lives are lost every year in road traffic accidents. We believe our technology has the potential to cut that number, perhaps by as much as half. We’re also confident that self-driving cars will transform car sharing, significantly reducing car usage, as well as help create the new “highway trains of tomorrow."

In order to accomplish it's goal Google has enlisted help from several leading participants in the field including "...some of the very best engineers from the DARPA Challenges, a series of autonomous vehicle races organized by the U.S. Government. Chris Urmson was the technical team leader of the CMU team that won the 2007 Urban Challenge. Mike Montemerlo was the software lead for the Stanford team that won the 2005 Grand Challenge. Also on the team is Anthony Levandowski, who built the world’s first autonomous motorcycle that participated in a DARPA Grand Challenge, and who also built a modified Prius that delivered pizza without a person inside." 

Here is a small video clip from the NYTimes article:  

Note that there is an occupant in the driver's seat who is a specially trained driver to man the controls in the event of a system failure, and a software engineer in the passenger seat who monitors the software. Google says that their major concern in the experiment was safety and that they had worked with local law enforcement on all test drives. The test drives where apparently scouted first by manned vehicles that mapped the route and noted road conditions. 

Is Skynet Closer Than We Think?

In a Globe and Mail article today entitled One robot, one vote? Neil Reynolds brings attention to the fact that robotics has progressed beyond what most of us are aware and that as the result Asimov's 3 laws of robotics will not suffice, it's not 1942 after all... and the lawyers might be pushing the agenda here, but Reynolds raises some interesting questions. Did you know that South Korea currently has robots patrolling it's border with Kim Jong Il's North Korea? or that the South Korean government is aiming to have a robot in each household by 2020? There has been much press about Japan's aging population and a thriving robotics industry working on machines to assist the elderly, but who will be responsible for decisions made by these machines or for their expensive upkeep? 

"The American Bar Association runs a permanent expert committee on artificial intelligence and robotics. In April, the committee published a number of special reports – on the state of AI in telemedicine, on advanced wiretapping and on military drones. In the May issue of The ABA Journal, the association will publish “Robot Rules” – an analysis of pending U.S. legislation that will, for the first time, assign liability for the actions of robots."

Have a read, it's rather thought provoking.

Autonomous Robots Used By Staples, Zappos, and Gap

Autonomous robots are making order picking easier for several big retailers. The robots made by Kiva Systems look like an over-sized orange Roomba and are charged with the task of finding the appropriate shelf that holds an item and delivering that shelf to a picking station where a human picks and packs the product.

"It's a major game-changer. There's no question about that. You can increase productivity immensely," said Michael Levans, editorial director for a group of supply-chain trade magazines like Logistics Management. "The Zappos guys claim that from the moment you put your order in and it is submitted to the time the box is on the dock and ready to be put on a truck is 12 minutes."

Check out the video...




Source: Wired

Robotic Fish Form Hunting Party

Researchers at the University of Washington are developing fish like robots that have the capability of working autonomously but share information with each other to form a Hunting Party. “There’s no human directly telling them what to do,” explains Kristi Morgansen, UW assistant professor of aeronautics and astronautics. She adds that, “They have a program on board and they’re getting various sensor information, either from their on-board sensors or stuff that’s transmitted over a wireless channel.”


RoboFish from James Eagan on Vimeo.

The "Robofish" have fish like fins rather than propellers to make them more maneuverable and less likely to get caught in kelp, rope, or fishing lines. “Fish are much more maneuverable in small spaces than things that we’ve been able to build in engineering with propellers."

I'm fascinated by these little guys! The video is impressive and the swarming, or shall I say "schooling" abilities are rather intriguing.

ScineCentral.com