[tweakmonkey]

You know I love these Google Tech Talks...

This one features Sebastian Thrun, one of the engineers responsible for Stanford University's victory in the DARPA Grand Challenge. This is where you create a completely unmanned vehicle capable of racing through almost 150 miles of desert terrain. The video's really neat, particularly when they get into the details of the laser and camera navigation systems used to figure out if the road ahead is driveable, how fast they can go, if obstacles will stop the movement, and so-on. You figure with automatically driven cars somewhere on the horizon, this AI and terrain mapping is cutting edge science. It's about 48 minutes long but worth it if you've got the time or you're into tech stuff.


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8594517128412883394