BMW's gorgeous 'Megacity' electric vehicle gets real [Cars]

You know all those awesome concept cars we're always showing you? BMW's 'Megacity' electric vehicle feels a lot like one of those, but the company actually has plans to bring this sleek, weird-wheeled-wonder out as early as 2013.


[DVICE]

Darpa's Urban Radar To Follow Your Car Everywhere You Go [DARPA]

If they succeed, DARPA will be able to follow your car everywhere you go—even if you get into downtown Manhattan's traffic—making movies with car chases absolutely pointless. If Steve McQueen were alive, he would be very sad today.

The new radar is called Multipath Exploitation Radar, and combines three-dimensional urban maps with a Ku-band radar running at frequencies high enough to resolve vehicle details. This makes the MER capable of fixing a target on anything that moves on the ground. The system will depend on unmanned air vehicles, bouncing their radars on ground and buildings and comparing the patterns with 3D maps. The result would be a complete picture of the movement in a city. Once they nail the chasing of one vehicle, DARPA wants to enable multiple target tracking.

Enjoy your freedom while it lasts, citizen.
[Gizmodo via New Scientist]

Now in Production: The First Google Android Car [CarDroid]

The first car equipped with Google’s Android mobile operating system will hit the streets this April 23. It’s called the Roewe 350, and it will launch at the Beijing Auto Show.
Roewe vehicles are luxury cars made by Chinese car company SAIC (Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation) using technology purchased from British company MG Rover, which has been owned by both BMW and Ford in the past.
The 2.1 version of Google Android — the same that Google used in the Nexus One and Motorola Droid — is installed on the vehicle’s GPS computer. You can use the computer for directions and traffic reports just as you can with many other GPS devices. But it’s not all vanilla; you can also surf the web and engage in some form of Internet chatting. There’s no telling yet which chat service you’ll be using, but hopefully you won’t be doing it while you’re driving!
We haven’t heard whether or not you’ll be able to install apps from the Android Market yet. We also don’t know how the device connects to the Internet. The car will cost between 70,000 and 130,000 yuan, or about $10,250 – $19,000.






[Mashable via The Next Web]
[img credit: autohome.com.cn]

This Car Will Run at 1,000mph [Cars]

Bloodhound is a car being designed to run at a swooshing one thousand miles-per-hour. That's 1,609 km/h, which is way faster than the speed of sound. As the video shows, it'll have more thrust than the Eurofighter combat jet:
Of course, the car has yet to be built, let alone break that record. But the effort is quite serious, these people are not amateur, and they have serious sponsors. It will use one EJ200 jet like the one used by the Eurofighter—hopefully a real one, unlike the one I got into at Dubai two years ago—alonside a one 18" hybrid rocket, and a V12 piston engines. The 6500-kilogram Bloodhound—which is being built in Bristol—will have a 47,000lbs trust, with a top speed of 1050mph.

The driver will be former RAF Wing Comander Andy Green, who broke the landspeed record in 1997.
[Gizmodo via Bloodhound via Techradar]

You Won't Need Chairlifts with the Fastest Snow Car In the World [Cars]

This Ken Block's new Subaru-based Trax STI and it's the fastest snow vehicle in the world.
I guess I won't be driving the Trax—with its 400hp engine, cat tracks, and four-snowboarder sleigh.
[via Gizmodo via Autoblog via Techeblog]

MIT's AIDA Robot Is Going To Be The Ultimate Backseat Driver [Robots]

Actually, the Affective Intelligent Driving Agent (AIDA) won't be riding in the backseat, it's mounted right on the dashboard—but it will make comments on how you drive. It also reacts to your emotional state and helps you navigate.

In other words, AIDA is like your highway helper. A robot pal you can bond with on those long lonely trips. Kind of like a naggy, whiny version of Kitt.

To identify the set of goals the driver would like to achieve, AIDA analyses the driver's mobility patterns, keeping track of common routes and destinations. AIDA draws on an understanding of the city beyond what can be seen through the windshield, incorporating real-time event information and knowledge of environmental conditions, as well as commercial activity, tourist attractions, and residential areas.
'When it merges knowledge about the city with an understanding of the driver's priorities and needs, AIDA can make important inferences,' explains Assaf Biderman, associate director of the SENSEable City Lab. 'Within a week AIDA will have figured out your home and work location. Soon afterwards the system will be able to direct you to your preferred grocery store, suggesting a route that avoids a street fair-induced traffic jam. On the way AIDA might recommend a stop to fill up your tank, upon noticing that you are getting low on gas,' says Biderman. 'AIDA can also give you feedback on your driving, helping you achieve more energy efficiency and safer behavior.'

Oh, and did I mention that it emotes with facial expressions? I have plenty of relatives that are perfectly willing to bitch about my driving as it is. On the other hand, maybe AIDA will qualify a an additional passenger on HOV lanes—then maybe it can tag along.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — MIT researchers and designers are developing the Affective Intelligent Driving Agent (AIDA) - a new in-car personal robot that aims to change the way we interact with our car. The project is a collaboration between the Personal Robots Group at the MIT Media Lab, MIT's SENSEable City Lab and the Volkswagen Group of America's Electronics Research Lab.
'With the ubiquity of sensors and mobile computers, information about our surroundings is ever abundant. AIDA embodies a new effort to make sense of these great amounts of data, harnessing our personal electronic devices as tools for behavioral support,' comments professor Carlo Ratti, director of the SENSEable City Lab. 'In developing AIDA we asked ourselves how we could design a system that would offer the same kind of guidance as an informed and friendly companion.'
AIDA communicates with the driver through a small robot embedded in the dashboard. 'AIDA builds on our long experience in building sociable robots,' explains professor Cynthia Breazeal, director of the Personal Robots Group at the MIT Media Lab. 'We are developing AIDA to read the driver's mood from facial expression and other cues and respond in a socially appropriate and informative way.'
AIDA communicates in a very immediate way: with the seamlessness of a smile or the blink of an eye. Over time, the project envisions that a kind of symbiotic relationship develops between the driver and AIDA, whereby both parties learn from each other and establish an affective bond.
To identify the set of goals the driver would like to achieve, AIDA analyses the driver's mobility patterns, keeping track of common routes and destinations. AIDA draws on an understanding of the city beyond what can be seen through the windshield, incorporating real-time event information and knowledge of environmental conditions, as well as commercial activity, tourist attractions, and residential areas.
'When it merges knowledge about the city with an understanding of the driver's priorities and needs, AIDA can make important inferences,' explains Assaf Biderman, associate director of the SENSEable City Lab. 'Within a week AIDA will have figured out your home and work location. Soon afterwards the system will be able to direct you to your preferred grocery store, suggesting a route that avoids a street fair-induced traffic jam. On the way AIDA might recommend a stop to fill up your tank, upon noticing that you are getting low on gas,' says Biderman. 'AIDA can also give you feedback on your driving, helping you achieve more energy efficiency and safer behavior.'
AIDA was developed in partnership with Audi, a premium brand of the Volkswagen Group, and the Volkswagen Group of America's Electronics Research Lab. The AIDA team is directed by Professor Cynthia Breazeal, Carlo Ratti, and Assaf Biderman. The SENSEable City Lab team includes team leader Giusy di Lorenzo and includes Francisco Pereira, Fabio Pinelli, Pedro Correia, E Roon Kang, Jennifer Dunnam, and Shaocong Zhou. The Personal Robots Group's technical and aesthetic team includes Mikey Siegel, Fardad Faridi and Ryan Wistort as well as videographers Paula Aguilera and Jonathan Williams. Chuhee Lee and Charles Lee represent the Volkswagen Group of America's Electronics Research Lab.

[Gizmodo via MIT]

Holographic laser head-up display, small enough for side mirror

Increasingly popular head-up displays aren't only for BMWs, Corvettes , Cadillacs, and F-16 jets. Light Blue Optics is making the tech more practical, creating a new projection device that's so small, it'll fit in a car's side mirror. It shows you an image that looks like it's about 6 feet behind you, superimposed over the road.

This trickery is possible because of a miniaturized holographic laser projector that's about a tenth the size of the head-up display system in the BMW 5 Series. It's small enough to install in a variety of configurations, and will work equally well on the windshield, or rearview mirrors and side mirrors.

These displays will be safer, too. The data appears to your eyes to be the same distance as other objects on the road, making it so you don't need to waste time focusing. Says Light Blue Optics head of business development Edward Buckley, 'At speeds of 100 kilometers an hour, this can cost you 22 meters in stopping distance.' Too bad Buckley says we won't see this technology in vehicles for four more years.
[DVICE via Technology Review]

Israel Innovation Generates Electricity by Driving on Roads [Green Energy]

An Israeli innovation succeeded in generating electricity from the traffic on roads. The power generator is based on a piezoelectric layer that is installed 5cm under the road pavement. Cars driving on the road applying their weight on the generators to create electricity which is stored in batteries on the sides of the road.

Currently the researchers tested the technology on 10 meters of single lane highway and managed to create 2000KW/h. If applied to 1 km of a 4 lane highway it is estimated, deduced from this experiment's results, to be able to create 1 MegaWatt/h of electricity, enough to supply electricity to about 2500 homes.

For the drivers nothing is changed in the driving experience. The electricity will be able to power street lamps, traffic lights and any road side consumer. Weather has no effect on the generators productivity or maintenance.


This is the first time roads are used to create electricity ever. Hoping to see more and more power generating road in the future.


Update: A physical conundrum came to my mind. How is possible to create energy without wasting energy? The weight of the car is creating the energy you say? Who will pay for this energy? The piezoelectric crystal materials which are the "Power Generators" change their physical properties when the traffic, the cars, runs over them and them they "stretch" back with their elasticity. But this is as if the cars is driving in a constant, although very small, climb. This is where the energy comes from - the fuel you and me pay for to fill our tanks. We will pay for this electricity without any reward (unless you count streetlights ROI, which we already pay city tax for!!!).


Let me know what you think in the comments.


[TheMarker (Heb)]

Google Earth Will Track Cars and People In Real Time [Google Earth]

This is one of the awesomestest and scariestest technology demonstrations I've seen in a long while: Georgia Institute of Technology's students are using CCTV video to map actual vehicles and people into Google Earth. Why is this scary?
Right now, all the data displayed is anonymous, which makes up for a cool looking technology. You could see a football game in real time or the actual traffic in your route to work. Eventually, you will be able to see clouds moving, the weather changing, and even birds move in real time.
Now, put on your tin foil hat and imagine.
Imagine that someone is able to tag you in some way. In theory, it could be as easy as having access to one of the CCTV cameras and this system. You mark a car on the screen and, provided that you have enough cameras along the way, the technology would be able to follow the vehicle wherever it goes. In England, for example, this will be really easy to do, because there are CCTV cameras absolutely everywhere. And let's not talk about RFID tags.
Of course, I'm sure that no government agency will be interested in using this for controlling someone's movements. Why would they?
Now, excuse me while I go pack and move to an island in the Maldives.
[Gizmodo via PopSci]