Mps reveal how self-driving vehicles rapidly navigate busy roads
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It's easy to feel unnerved when sitting in a self-driving car.
Not only do they have to navigate a labyrinth of roads, but they also have to watch out for a host of threats, such as other cars, pedestrians and slippery roads - all in real-time.
With Google maps being too slow for the average car, researchers have developed technology that allows a car to 'see' the road in high definition with what they claim to be 10-20 cm precision.
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Nokia Here, the maps division the Finnish communications company, has revealed exactly what a car would see through these ultra-high definition maps. Pictured is an illustration of how a map would identify a cars lane position in relation to the rest of the road network
Now, Nokia Here, the maps division of the Finnish communications company, has revealed exactly what a car would see through these ultra-high definition maps.
'We believe an even deeper level of granularity is now needed,' Here wrote on its blog.
'We're moving forward, with future localisation positioning technology able to identify a vehicle and its surroundings on a map with an accuracy of around 10-20cm.
'Such surroundings include lane marking types, intersections, signs and more, helping Here to provide more advanced safety features.'
Here collects billions of 3D points to model the surface of the road. The maps include lanes, their boundaries, the lane center, and where the cars are supposed to drive.
Here collects billions of 3D points to model the surface of the road. The maps include lanes, their boundaries, the lane center, and where the cars are supposed to drive. This image shows the difference between traditional maps (green lines) and highly precise maps (red and blue lines)
Pictured here is data collected by Here maps from vehicles traveling highways around Berlin
The maps are using Lidar sensors which use a rapidly-spinning laser array to bounce light off the surrounding area and then measure its distance.
The company says a map with increased detail will enable a self-driving car to know, for instance, which lane it's in on a multi-lane highway.
It will also be able to identify its lane location in comparison to the closest vehicle or object.
'Driver safety is increased even more when details also start to include speed limits, no passing signs and other road guidelines,' Here said.
Kill Screen says maps such as this block out all irrelevant information for a car to drive on anything but the road.
It instead provides mapping of lanes, dividers, and turning radiuses, or 'the kind of things a car's literal-minded brain would need.'
Sensors can already offer alerts when a car is moving too close to another object, but additional information from map coverage provides a more complete picture, cutting out sensor blind spots.'
Sensors can already offer alerts when a car is moving too close to another object, but additional information from map coverage provides a more complete picture, cutting out sensor blind spots'
An interior view of a Google self-driving car showing the video and the data the car uses to 'see' the road
The map can provide the ability to identify if a car is in lane three or four of an eight-lane highway, or the matrix environment of an intersection with no lane markings.
As well as this, self-driving cars could access information about driving-related events and road networks from an online cloud to provide a deeper level of knowledge than ever before.
'We're talking cars armed with the ability to see around corners and know the environment before they reach an intersection,' the group wrote.
As well as this, connectivity could alert the car to upcoming slippery conditions in near real-time.
As well as sensors, though, the connected map will serve an important role in providing information on where a car is and what's going on around it.
Self-driving cars could access information about driving-related events and road networks from an online cloud to provide a deeper level of knowledge than ever before
Soon cars could be armed with the ability to see around corners and know the conditions before they get there
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