Robot Car

September 19, 2007

You won’t have to worry about this car’s driver being distracted by a cell phone or a song on the radio. It doesn’t have a driver. The Navigator, as named by the University of Florida engineers who built it, pilots itself. It’s a heavily modified 2006 Toyota Highlander that robotics engineer Carl Crane and his team have designed for urban travel.

Crane: “There are a lot of things that people take for granted that seem easy to do, but we have to get the computer to do it all by itself, such as find the lane and the stripes and stay in your lane. What if there’s a slow vehicle in your lane and you want to pass it?”

A vast array of computers, cameras, and other equipment control the speed and maneuverability of the car. Researchers developed it to compete in a government-sponsored test of skills for unmanned vehicles.

Crane: “One of the hardest ones is being able to interact with other vehicles. We have to be able to go, for example, to a four-way stop intersection, determine who has precedence and right of way and successfully navigate through those.”

The Navigator will put its city driving talents on the line against other unmanned vehicles in late October.