DARPA Grand Challenge Finalists Announced

Xerotope writes "DARPA announced today the 23 finalists[pdf warning] of the DARPA Grand Challenge at the closing ceremonies of the National Qualifying Event. Carnegie Mellon University's Red Team will start on Saturday with the first and third positions, with 'H1ghlander' taking the pole position and 'Sandstorm' following 10 minutes later. Stanford's 'Stanley' will start second. Of the 43 semi-finalists, 23 robots managed to finish the 2.2 mile course at least once. 5 robots (Stanford, Red Team, Red Team Too, Axion Racing, and Team Teramax) completed all of their runs. CMU's 'H1ghlander' and 'Sandstorm' finished the four runs with an average time of 10 minutes, 20 seconds each. Stanford's Stanley average time was 10:43."

Comments

Re:Terminator or Explorer?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well golly, since the whole thing is sponsored by DARPA, an agency of the US Department of Defense, I think they'll use this technology to ^(80948Q#4NO CARRIER

More information and Video coverage here

[rayver]

Video coverage here (there's a whole bunch. The overview, stanley and ghostrider ones are awesome!):

http://www.cartv.com.nyud.net:8090/content/researc h/channels/index.cfm/channel/cartv_video/action/sh owvideo/vid/e_0145/vcat/Event/
NQE final paper:

http://www.darpa.mil/grandchallenge/NQEfinal1.pdf

And more announcements can be found on:

http://www.grandchallenge.org/

Also, a good summary of things that have been happening can be found in the discussion forum:

https://dtsn.darpa.mil/grandc/forum/topic.asp?topi c_id=1636&forum_id=30&Topic_Title=NQE&forum_title= Grand+Challenge+Event&M=False&S=

=====
A post by Espina reads:
Hi! ...stopped by the NQE last week and this whole Tuesday and I must say that all the work accomplished on all the AGVs was very impressive. ...for those who couldn't be there the following bots all had runs in the morning session: "Mojavaton, DAD, CIMAR, Insight Racing, Golem Group, ENSCO, Princeton, MonsterMoto, Team Jefferson, UCF,, AION, Cajunbot, Banzai, Gray Team, Mitre Meteorites, Virginia Tech Grand Challenge Team, Austin Robot, Desert Buckeyes." All had full runs except five. Majavaton and Insight Racing which both collided with a vehicle/obstacle within 100 yards of the finish line. Aion decided to skip the course and circle back directly to the finish line but a K- rail barrier refused to co-operate. The UCF bot went walkabout on the back 40 towards the NASCAR track and Austin Robotics got sulky in the first loop when the crowd left for lunch during its run. MonsterMoto was given a restart because a chase truck encroached on the route near the start. ...according to some team members from Ensco, the afternoon session was a chance for the teams "on the cusp" to improve their standings. Austin Robotics, CajunBot, VT, Team Banzai, Mojavaton, the Mitre Group, and the Gray Team all had additional runs. ...Mojavaton, VT, Mitre (had two) and the Gray Team all had full runs. The Gray Team had two runs but was unable to to get GPS back after the tunnel on the first run so they made a few adjustments and had a stellar 2nd run. It seemed like a time/constelation problem. CajunBot made it to the last Obstacle/vehicle to the chagrin of the crowd. Team Banzai froze contemplating a witch's hat on a downhill transition at the end of the first loop and Austin Robotics lost GPS (and its way) after the tunnel... ...after that the best of the rest ran (Autonosys, Blue Team, Overbot, Indiana Robotic NAV, BJB Engineering, Team Juggernaut, Autonomous Vehicle Systems, Team Tormenta, Indy Robot Racing, Terra Engineering, PVHA Road Warriors, CyberRider, AI Motorvators, Team Underdawg. )with most of the teams wiping out the first barrier, and/or re-arranging the hay bales at the tunnel entrance, colliding with the tunnel entrance and losing GPS after the tunnel. However, IT, from AI motorvaters had a full run on the shortened RDDF and TerraHawk made it thru most of the hard parts. Overbot ran very thoroughly and cautiously but froze on the downhill transition. ...if any of this information is incorrect please feel free to fix...I could be suffering the effects of sunstroke... ...anyhow, good luck all and I admire dedication of all of the teams on completing an AGV. ...see y'all in Primm, Espina

well if the summary isn't going to explain it...

[fanblade]

If you're wondering what the DARPA Challenge is, you have to scroll to the bottom the their flash website:

"The DARPA Grand Challenge is an unprecedented government effort to accelerate research and development in autonomous ground vehicles to help save American lives on the battlefield. DARPA will award $2 million to the autonomous (robotic) ground vehicle that can successfully navigate a challenging desert course of approximately 150 miles the fastest (in less than 10 hours). The vehicles must find and follow a prescribed course route, avoid obstacles, and negotiate turns, all while travelling at militarily-relevant rates of speed. The ground vehicles are fully autonomous - not remote-controlled."

We can't even imagine the uses this will be put to

[John Jorsett]

The answer of course is that, once autonomous vehicles are possible and proven, the door is open to any use. The military will use them to deliver supplies, and so will relief organizations. Private companies will use them to transport materials for, for example, the building of remote pipelines or roads. Ranchers will use them to patrol the boundaries of their acreage. Security companies will employ autonomous vehicles to keep an eye on the perimeters of land they're guarding. Universities will use them to explore the arctic, antarctic, and other hostile environments. Radical nutjobs will use them to deliver deadly payloads instead of using human beings. And there will be a host of applications that we haven't even thought of yet.