Just How Likely are Cars with Helper-Drones?

As reported by SlashGear: As arch-creator of concept car follies, Rinspeed is no stranger to outlandish designs, but just how practical is the drone-equipped Etos? The self-driving concept can deploy a similarly self-flying unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) from a bay at the back, with a variety of potential uses that include delivering forgotten items or filming particularly interesting stretches of road.

"For example, it could fetch a bouquet of flowers the driver ordered online and even deliver it directly to the lucky recipient," Rinspeed suggests. "It could also take a video of the wild ride on the favorite fun road and stream it live to friends!"

The Etos isn't going to get anywhere near production, used instead as a four-wheeled billboard of sorts for the customization projects that actually pay Rinspeed's bills.

Nonetheless, it isn't the first firm to suggest pairing a car with its own pet drone. Last year, for instance, Renault brought its Kwid concept to the Delhi Auto Expo, a chunky little urban SUV with a landing pad for a companion UAV on the roof.

Like with the Etos, the Kwid's drone could be used for taking aerial photography, but it might also have a role in spotting traffic jams and other road congestion up ahead, the French firm theorized.

Modern drones have no issues with basic following, and indeed many - like DJI's Phantom 3 - can be set to automatically track their operators. That usually involves a fixed altitude, or a preset route, however, rather than the sort of dynamic flight that an application like the car companies have in mind would demand.

It's when things get unpredictable, according to 3D Robotics - which launched its ownSolo smart drone earlier this year that promises easier GoPro shots courtesy of autopilot presets and a following mode - that the technology will need to raise its game.

"In short, yes, it is well within the realm of the possible to build a drone that can take off from a moving car, and then return to land, dock and recharge," company spokesperson Roger Sollenberger told me. "But as with any autonomous mobile technology, there are a number of problems to anticipate and solve before possible becomes practical. The anticipation is the important part, the unknown unknowns, etc."

Nonetheless, Sollenberger is confident that the tech side can mature sufficiently to meet the challenge. "[There] are some key technologies will preclude a lot of these issues," he explained, though whether they'll be practical is a separate question.

"Sense & avoid, so the drone will be able to navigate any obstacles in its path," Sollenberger lists, "the next generation of batteries, with more juice and a shorter recharging period; ground sensing (part of sense & avoid) so the drone would avoid things like [trying to follow a car through a tunnel]; air traffic control for drones, so that drones and other aircraft can 'deconflict' the airspace in real time as they fly; and of course, a regulatory framework - where and when can you launch from and land on your car? How fast can you go? - that can account for and incorporate new technology such as this."

"And this is the point where 'possible' and 'practical' meet, perhaps converge, perhaps not."

As for helping autonomous vehicles figure out what's happening on the route up ahead, even with their lofty perspective drones might not be the best source of information there.

Arguably more likely is a growth in car-to-car and car-to-X intercommunication, with autonomous and semi-autonomous vehicles effectively chatting between themselves and sharing real-time information on what hazards there might be around the corner. That data would have the benefit of tapping into the high-resolution radar, camera, IR, and other surveying data from the cars' own sensors.

It also saves you from worrying about mid-air drone collisions, or more mundane issues like running out of charge.

In short, while a flock of drones surrounding your car might make for a cool concept, for the moment the only eye-in-the-sky watching out for you is probably waiting to give you a speeding ticket.

Elon Musk Says He Has a Design for an Electric Powered VTOL Jet

As reported by Business Insider: If Elon Musk was not already running Tesla and SpaceX he might take up another big project: creating an electric jet. 

In fact, when asked during a recent Marketplace interview what Musk would be doing if Tesla didn't exist, he revealed that he already has a design for such an aircraft ready to go. 

“I do like the idea of an electric aircraft company. I think one could do a pretty cool supersonic, vertical, take-off and landing electric jet. That would be really fun... I have a design in mind for that," he said. 

"Then of course there is the Hyperloop, I’d probably be working on that,” he casually added. 

This is not the first time Musk has mentioned that he is interested in this kind of project. 

During another recent interview with CNN Money, Musk said that the "ideal, long distance transportation mechanism is a supersonic, vertical take-off and landing electric jet."

Musk told Marketplace that excluding rockets, he believes one day all vehicles will be electric, so he thinks it's a promising venture.

“Aircraft and ships and all other forms of transport will go fully electric. Not half electric, but fully electric. No question,” he said.

Musk, though, said he has enough on his plate right now. The visionary billionaire already runs his electric car company and SpaceX and has big plans for both companies over the next few years. 

One big goal of Musk's is getting Tesla's giant Gigafactory in Nevada into production. The company aims to make enough batteries to power 500,000 cars per year so it can finally begin production of its more affordable vehicle, the Tesla Model 3, which is expected to go into production in 2017 and be priced at $35,000. 

"We have the Model X, that we obviously have to ramp up production of. We have a complete model of the Model 3, we have the battery pack business... and so there is a lot of work that needs to be done," Musk said. "But I feel at this point Tesla is in a really solid position. And at this point it’s a matter of how quickly can we bring an affordable electric car to market — how quickly can we bring affordable battery storage to market."

Driverless Bus Takes On Busy Streets, Bicyclists, Dogs in Greek Town

As reported by NBC News: There will be no arguing with the driver on this bus: the rides are free and there's no driver anyway.

Trikala, a rural town in northern Greece, has been chosen to test a driverless bus in real traffic conditions for the first time, part of a European project to revolutionize mass transport and wean its cities off oil dependency over the next 30 years.

Trials of the French-built CityMobil2 buses started last week and will last through late February.

A CityMobil2 driverless bus makes its way along a road in Trikala, Greece, on Tuesday.

Over the past year, CityMobil2 has been tried out near its base in La Rochelle in western France, on a campus in Lausanne, Switzerland, and near Helsinki, Finland, all in controlled conditions that produced no accidents.

But in Greece, a country of narrow, winding, hilly streets, stray dogs, bicycle riders and impatient drivers, the buses are up against real traffic.

The Greek government had to amend its laws to allow the testing and the city had to build a dedicated bus lane that deprived residents of downtown parking spaces.

The robot buses don't look like science fiction vehicles — more like golf cart meets ice-cream truck. Still, heads turn as the skinny, battery-powered buses hum through the streets. They seat only 10 people and are guided by GPS and supplementary sensors, including lasers and cameras, that send live data to a control center.

The buses go no faster than 20 kph (12 1/2 mph), but the trials in Trikala (pronounced TREE-kah-lah) potentially represent a major advance for automated transport.

"There were cities bidding for this project all over Europe. They offered relatively restricted urban areas. But we said we could make it happen in a downtown environment and we won," said Odisseas Raptis, who heads the city's digital project department, e-Trikala. "We have a 2.4-kilometer (1.5-mile) route, the bus route. It's mixed with traffic, with pedestrians, with bicycles, with cars. ... That hasn't been done before."

Vasilis Karavidas, chief technician for the project in Greece, trained with Robosoft, the company that developed the bus, in the southwest French town of Bidart.

Although the driverless buses are fully automated with onboard navigation and obstacle detection systems, each vehicle will be monitored by a driver in the control center who can override the system, Karavidas said.

"It's as if they are in here and they can stop the bus if they want to, if something goes wrong," he said.

The buses are currently running without passengers, with full testing to start later this month when a fiber-optic network allowing faster data transmission is completed.

Six battery-powered vehicles will eventually be used in this farming town of 80,000 that has become hooked on high-tech.

Trikala already has already tested EU-funded pilot medical programs, including schemes to relay heart test data from home to the doctor's office and use tracker devices for Alzheimer patients.

A view out the front windshield of the driverless CityMobil2 bus. Thanasssis Stavrakis / AP

In the center of the city, a "digital tree" with solar panels allows benches to carry phone-charging outlets.

The 28-nation European Union is targeting gasoline use for city transport as one area where it wants to reduce carbon emissions. With oil prices and city populations expected to rise in the coming decades, a major shift to battery power and more shared transport could blur the line between private and public vehicles.

"THERE IS A GOOD CHANCE THAT THESE TECHNOLOGIES WILL CREATE ENTIRELY NEW USES THAT WE CAN ONLY POORLY GRASP TODAY."

Senior transport analyst Philippe Crist at the International Transport Forum, an OECD think-tank based in Paris, says transport trends are hard to predict as the world moves more toward automation.

"We too often look at technological changes in isolation," said Crist. "There is a good chance that these technologies will create entirely new uses that we can only poorly grasp today. The reality is that everything is changing around these technologies and it is plausible that society may lose interest in owning cars or using fixed-service public transport — especially if these technologies allow better alternatives to emerge."

Models run by the think tank suggest that city transport could be made massively more efficient.

Crist said researchers looked at "shared and route-optimized on-call taxi-like services replacing all car and bus trips in a mid-sized European city. We found that these systems could deliver almost the same mobility as today but with 95 percent fewer vehicles."

Driverless cars and buses offer an easier way to optimize traffic flow while aiming to eliminate human error. That has transport developers working at both ends: adding automatic features to conventional vehicles while raising the bar for those that will have no driver at all.

So far, the CityMobile2 has had mixed reviews on the streets of Trikala. Not everyone is happy to lose parking spots or replace human jobs with machines.

Still, retiree Michalis Pantelis said he was proud that his city was selected for the testing.

"I think it's wonderful. Think how many people will come to Trikala to see this. It's new and innovative," he said, moments after a driverless bus passed by. "It reminds me of the toy cars my grandchildren play with."

Here's the Physics Behind That Insane Chinese Traffic Jam

As reported by Gizmodo: A few days ago, a drone captured this eye-popping video of the world’s worst traffic jam on the G4 Beijing-Hong Kong-Macau Expressway. Blame foggy weather if you like, but physics says it all comes down to a question of density — namely, an unusually high number of people returning to Beijing after a week-long holiday festival.

I’ve never seen anything like this, and I live in Los Angeles; the City of Angels frequently tops the list of places with the worst traffic in the country, along with Washington, DC, San Francisco, New York City, Atlanta, Chicago, and even Seattle. Traffic flow is a big problem in most major urban centers. The average US motorist spends 36 hours every year in traffic delays. But China — man, China takes the crown when it comes to insanely congested traffic. A study last year found that the average Chinese driver spends the equivalent ofnine days a year stuck in traffic.

Scientists have been studying traffic patterns for years, trying to build mathematical models to devise some kind of solution to keep us all from snapping and turning into Michael Douglas’s rampaging motorist, D-FENS, in the 1993 film Falling Down.

One of them is a physicist named Boris Kerner with the Daimler Benz Research Institute in Stuttgart, Germany, who published a seminal paper in Physical Review Letters in 1998. He analyzed data collected from several years of traffic along German highways and found that traffic follows the physics of self organization.

Kerner’s model sorts traffic into three categories: freely flowing, jammed (solid state), and an intermediate state called synchronized flow, in which densely packed “car molecules” move in unison, like members of a marching band. As I wrote back in 2011:

When this happens — when all the cars are traveling at close to the same average speed because of the vehicle density on the roadway — they become highly dependent on one another. A physicist might compare the relationship to the correlated motion of electrons in metals, which gives rise to weird phenomena like superconductivity.

Highly correlated traffic means that a tiny perturbation — a butterfly flapping its wings, or a single driver braking unexpectedly — will send little ripples of corresponding slowdowns through the entire chain of cars behind him/her. That’s one reason why slowdowns and traffic jams occur most commonly at merge points, especially exit and entrance ramps, or when lanes are closed due to road construction.

Or at toll points on mega-highways when not enough booths are open, forcing 50 lanes jam-packed with cars — 50 lanes? WTF, China?!? —to merge down to 20.

Granted, so-called “phantom” traffic jams (or “jamitons”) can happen even when there’s no exacerbating factor. It’s a delicate balancing act. There’s a critical threshold for traffic, and once it’s reached, even tiny fluctuations can cause a chain reaction that eventually results in a jam. Eventually you get a “pinch effect” — that frustrating “stop and go” phenomenon, in which you escape one narrow jam only to encounter another a little further down the road, until they all converge into a single wide jam and traffic comes to a standstill.

Just something to think about the next time you find yourself cursing at congested traffic.

The Current List of Self-Driving Cars in Development

As reported by TechRadar: The self-driving car is under development by a number of companies, and is largely expected to be the next big wave in car technology, if not locomotion in general. A number of companies have expressed very public interest in self-driving technology, so we could very well see this moonshot effort snowball into a full-blown sea change in how we get around.

Think about it: if a car could drive itself, hours of our time per day would be freed up for commuters everywhere. We could work on the drive to work. Or we could drive all the way across the US without spending hours at rest stops, making pit stops only to refuel or recharge. Convenience, however, isn't even the best aspect of self-driving cars. These autonomous vehicles are already proving significantly safer than normal cars, with the potential to save thousands of lives per year.

With so many companies working on the new tech, it can be hard to keep track of them all. That's why we've put together a complete list (as of this writing) of all the self driving cars under development.

Google

Google has been working on self-driving cars for a number of years, and has been very public about it. The company first announced that it was working on the technology in 2012, and originally started with modified cars from the likes of Toyota, Audi, and Lexus. Soon, however, the company had built a fleet of self-driving cars, composed entirely of modified Lexus SUVs.

As if that wasn't enough for the company, it had soon developed a car of its own to test with, appropriately called the Google Car, which can be seen roaming the streets of northern California for testing. In fact, in June of this year, Google announced that its cars had completed 1 million miles of driving, which is a pretty amazing feat.

Google itself hopes to have self-driving cars on the roads by 2020, however it doesn't intend to become a car manufacturer itself, instead likely licensing the technology to other companies.

Uber

It was a little surprising to hear that Uber was working on self-driving cars in April of this year, however it certainly makes sense. If Uber didn't need to pay drivers, it would be able to make far more money, with company costs being significantly lower.

Uber is working on the technology with Carnegie Mellon, and has announced the Uber Advanced Technologies Center in partnership with the university. This is where the bulk of research will take place, and the center is being led by John Bares.

What we don't know much about is Uber's progress in self-driving technology, and the company has remained largely secretive about any developments that it has made since the announcement of the creation of the Uber Advanced Technologies Center. All we know more than this is that Uber has also opened a research and development facility in Arizona in partnership with the state's eponymous university.

Tesla

Tesla developing self-driving technology is also something that makes sense, especially considering the fact that the company has largely remained at the forefront of automotive technology, both under the hood and behind the wheel.

In fact, Tesla has equipped its cars with many of the sensors that would be required in a self-driving car, enabling the company to turn on certain self-driving features with a simple software update. A few features are even already available, such as a mode that allows Tesla's cars to drive themselves on highways. Of course, drivers themselves have to maintain control in cities.

Apart from that, Tesla has hinted in the past that it may have something in the works with Google. As mentioned before, Google will likely license its technology to other companies, and Tesla certainly could be one of those companies.

Of course, we will have to wait and see, as it seems as though Tesla is also developing its own self-driving technology.

Honda

Honda is another company that has been pretty public about its development of self-driving cars, however it certainly hasn't gotten as much publicity as the likes of Google.

Honda's self-driving car currently looks similar to the car that Google uses to capture Street View images, with large sensors on the top of the car. The data captured by the sensors and cameras on the car is blended with GPS data, like street and speed limit information.

While it might not look like it's ready for the road, Honda's self-driving car is the culmination of years of safety and auto tech research. The company has allowed a number of reporters to take test drives, many of which have said that the car can merge into traffic better than some people.

Not only that, but the sensors can capture data hundreds of meters ahead of the car, showing traffic not only around the car but also quite a bit in the distance.

Mercedes-Benz

Mercedes' most notable involvement with self-driving technology has been with the "research car" called the F 015.

The car was designed to be ultra-futuristic in every way, with the interior of the car being extremely luxurious and roomy, offering plenty of room for things like working and sleeping. The two front seats of the car can also turn around so that the two sets of seats can face each other. The entire car is designed to be a driving experience from the year 2030.

As far as the technology behind it goes, Mercedes is careful not to label the car as a concept car, preferring to instead call it a "research car." In short, it is using the new car to develop its own self-driving technology. Mercedes says that it has made significant advancements in this, however the car still doesn't react very well to rain or extreme heat.

It's important to note that the car is still a prototype, however it does highlight the fact that Mercedes is seriously working on self-driving technology.

BMW

While some companies might be working with Google to develop self-driving technology, BMW has turned to Chinese search giant Baidu, often called the "Chinese Google."

In fact, Baidu says that it plans on releasing a fully-functioning autonomous vehicle by the end of the year – yes, this year.

The two companies first announced their partnership in April of 2015, and the goal is that the car will first be released in China. While it will be a prototype, it will be used to collect data and test how road-ready Baidu's self-driving technology is.

Audi

Audi is another carmaker set on getting a self-driving car out as soon as possible, and announced late last year that it hoped to put one on sale by 2016. That means that, sometime next year, we should have a self-driving car from Audi.

To prepare for the release, the company has built a modified A7, which it has been testing around the world, particularly in China.

Delphi

Delphi, like Honda, has been concentrating more on the technology behind self-driving cars rather than what a self-driving car might look like. The company has, however, advanced in leaps and bounds with the development.

In fact, the team at Delphi managed a whopping 3,400 mile drive all the way across the US, from San Francisco to New York, using predominantly self-driving technology.

Delphi, like Google, has been testing its self-driving car tech on the streets of San Francisco, and its car has even encountered a Google car on the road, reporting that the two cars interacted in a way that was completely safe and secure.

Apple

The Cupertino firm's autonomous vehicle hasn't been confirmed, and probably won't be until we see it drive itself across the Apple event stage. However, with all the hype, it would be hard to imagine Apple not working on self-driving technology.

Rumors have been surfacing for months now about Apple building a team of top automotive engineers. Not only that, but the company has reportedly even been scoping out locations for top-secret car testing.

Only time will tell if Apple actually releases a self-driving car of any kind, as some outlets – citing sources close to the matter – report that the company will release an electric car before a driverless one.

United Launch Alliance Needs Relief on Russian Engine Ban Before GPS Launch Bid

Russia's RD-180 rocket engines are needed by the ULA in order to bid on upcoming GPS III launches using their
Atlas 5 rockets.

As reported by Reuters: United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N) and Boeing Co (BA.N), on Friday said it cannot bid in a U.S. Air Force competition to launch a GPS satellite unless it gets some relief from a ban on use of Russian rocket engines.

ULA Chief Executive Officer Tory Bruno told reporters in Cape Canaveral, Florida, that the company was seeking a partial waiver on trade sanctions enacted last year which ban U.S. military use of the Russian RD-180 engine that powers ULA's primary workhorse Atlas 5 rocket.

The issue is now in the hands of Defense Secretary Ash Carter, Bruno said. Without the waiver, he said, ULA could not compete for that launch or any other new national security launches until an American-built engine is ready in 2019.

Bruno said the company needed a decision to be able to submit a bid for the GPS launch competition, the first time in nearly a decade that launches of large U.S. military satellites will be opened to competition.

Claire Leon, director of the Launch Enterprise Directorate at Air Force Space Command, said ULA has the option of formally requesting an RD-180 waiver as part of its bid.

"It is critical to the Air Force that we get more than one bidder. We are actively working different ways to make it possible for ULA to bid,” Leon told reporters on a conference call. “We are hoping that they will bid on this proposal."

U.S. lawmakers banned use of the Russian engines for U.S. military and spy satellite launches last year after Russia's annexation of the Crimea region of Ukraine.

The Air Force earlier this year approved privately held Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, to compete for such launches against ULA, which has been the monopoly provider for most Air Force satellite launches since its creation in 2006.The Air Force issued final rules for the GPS 3 launch competition on Wednesday, and bids are due Nov. 16.

"Today I still have no engines to bid," Bruno told reporters after ULA's 100th consecutive successful launch, an unmanned Atlas 5 rocket carrying a Mexican communications satellite.

SpaceX's Merlin Rocket undergoing testing.

The ban does not affect RD-180 engines used for NASA and commercial missions, but whenever ULA taps its current RD-180 inventory for non-military flights, it cannot order a replacement for later use on a military missions. Bruno said ULA is burning through its supply of RD-180 engines at a rate of one every four to six weeks.

Bruno said the ban affected 24 of 29 engines that ULA had ordered from Russia, but not paid for, before Russia invaded Crimea. The five engines that could be used under the law had already been assigned to other missions and were not available for ULA to use in a bid for the GPS III launch, he said.

Bruno said he was encouraged that U.S. lawmakers had allowed use of four more engines in a compromise version of the fiscal 2016 defense authorization bill. But President Barack Obama has said he plans to veto the bill, which means ULA needs a Pentagon waiver.