London (England) – The lowly and much reviled African locust could prevent needless car crashes.  Researchers at Volvo and the University of Newcastle are studying anti-collision mechanisms in the locust and hope the information will help build faster and more efficient braking systems.

Every year locust swarms devastate crops around the world, but even though are millions of bugs in a swarm they surprisingly almost never hit each other.  Scientists believe the locusts have an internal radar-like mechanism built just behind the eyes.  The “radar” sweeps an area in front of the bug and if an obstacle is detected the signal to turn is sent directly to the wings.

In a video interview with Reuters, the scientists say this makes the locusts the “master of collision avoidance”.  Volvo and the university researchers hope to create a Vision System on a Chip (VSoC) using CMOS sensors.  But replicating nature isn’t so easy.

Jonas Ekmark, Volvo’s director of preventive safety, told Wired that the locust processing system is “much more sophisticated” than modern technology.  “Technology was no match for nature,” he added.  Perhaps that’s why the company is predicting that it will take 10 to 15 years before this technology will make it into mainstream cars.

Using cameras to detect collisions isn’t anything new and many of the teams that were at last year’s DARPA Urban Challenge used various types of sensors on their robotic cars to detect obstacles.  However, most of the cars opted to use scanning lasers or LIDAR instead of regular vision cameras and webcams.  Regular cameras sense objects through pattern recognition and contrast detection, something that doesn’t work too well in bland urban environments and bright sunlight.

lawsuit waiting to happen

Sep 22, 2008 09:49     

sounds like an mishap in the programming will cause an accident that wasn't going to happen and a huge lawsuit. image it trying to steer me out of the way of a stopped car right into incoming traffic. wonderful!
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