Three college students from Griffith University in Australia have created an autonomous vehicle using just a smartphone and a toy Power Wheels car. This self-driving car navigates its way around by plotting a GPS course on the smartphone. Meanwhile, it uses a connected camera sensor to see where the road lanes are, and to spot any other hazards on the traffic-laden streets. This one smartphone system also controls all of the car's steering and acceleration.
It's amazing how these three Griffith University managed to develop a self-driving car using just a single smartphone with a camera sensor. More elaborate self-driving cars such as the Google's, on the other hand, utilize a computer control system linked to lasers and other hazard sensing cameras.
The self-driving car, developed by Tommi Sullivan, Michael Lennon, and Yukito Tsunoda, recently won the Queensland iAward. Next up the team plans on migrating their autonomous smartphone system to a larger, more road-worthy three-wheeled vehicle.
[Griffith University via Wired]
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