from the ongoing-quest-to-capture-the-Roadrunner dept.
Light shaken and stirred to help autonomous vehicles better scan for nearby fast-moving objects:
A self-driving car has a hard time recognizing the difference between a toddler and a brown bag that suddenly appears into view because of limitations in how it senses objects using lidar.
The autonomous vehicle industry is exploring “frequency modulated continuous wave” (FMCW) lidar to solve this problem.
[...] FMCW lidar detects objects by scanning laser light from the top of an autonomous vehicle. A single laser beam splits into a comb of other wavelengths, called a microcomb, to scan an area. Light bounces off of an object and goes to the detector through an optical isolator or circulator, which ensures all reflected light ends up at the detector array.
[...] The technology integrates microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) transducers made of aluminum nitride to modulate the microcomb at high frequencies ranging from megahertz to gigahertz. The optical isolator that the team developed as part of this process is further described in a paper published in Nature Communications.
[...] “The stirring motion modulates light such that it can only travel in one direction,” said Sunil Bhave, a Purdue professor of electrical and computer engineering.
[...] Other transducers in the same technology excite an acoustic wave that shakes the chip at megahertz frequencies, demonstrating sub-microsecond control and tuning of the laser pulse microcomb or soliton.
Journal Reference:
Junqiu Liu, Hao Tian, Erwan Lucas, et al. Monolithic piezoelectric control of soliton microcombs, Nature (DOI: 10.1038/s41586-020-2465-8)
Hao Tian, Junqiu Liu, Bin Dong, et al. Hybrid integrated photonics using bulk acoustic resonators [open], Nature Communications (DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-16812-6)
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 21 2020, @11:12PM (2 children)
Run over the toddler and the brown bag, and let God sort it out later. Chances are the toddler wouldn't have amounted to much, and the bag should have looked both ways before crossing.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 22 2020, @01:08AM
Easier... Learn how to drive
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 22 2020, @02:07AM
But I don't believe in God (I am polite enough to use upper case for those readers that do).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday July 21 2020, @11:26PM (7 children)
Think about the implications for a second: that chip just oscillated millions of times while you took that second to think. The vibrational impulse motions are propagating from the source down the material at the speed of sound, which in solid silicon is 8433m/s, or 0.84cm per microsecond. Two of these things closely gapped and appropriately phased should make a nice micro-air pump.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 0) by Ethanol-fueled on Wednesday July 22 2020, @12:41AM (3 children)
Whoooa, that's deep. Because that MHz crystal oscillator in my Sony Walkman just totally blew my brains out! I-uh....I'm oscillating! I'm gonnnna resonnnnnnnate! Aaaaahhhhhh! Uhhhhhh! Shewowies!
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 22 2020, @01:10AM (2 children)
My microwave (~2ghz) oscillated so fast that my weiner split and burst into flames
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 22 2020, @01:18AM (1 child)
That will teach you not to put your weiner in the microwave.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday July 22 2020, @02:35AM
Especially wrapped in tinfoil.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 22 2020, @01:52AM (2 children)
> appropriately phased should make a nice micro-air pump.
So far all you have is an AC air pump which is roughly analogous to a loud speaker. To make a pump you need a foot valve / check valve / "diode-for-air" that also works at that high frequency.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday July 22 2020, @02:38AM
Think about a bedsheet, flop that bedsheet and send a wave down it, now - put another bedsheet above it and flop it in opposite phase, you've got a linearly travelling cavity not too different from a peristaltic pump, moving at 8443m/s.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 2) by Muad'Dave on Wednesday July 22 2020, @11:21AM
I just learned about this [wikipedia.org] yesterday (YIL?) It's exactly what you describe. Of course Tesla designed it.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 22 2020, @02:04AM
First we were going to get self-driving cars using cameras & radar, then that wasn't good enough (except for Tesla who keep running into stationary objects). Next expensive Lidar was added to the sensing suite. Now we hear that normal Lidar isn't good enough either. No one has a good approach to bad weather although radar pointed at the ground (with a matching subsurface map) could be an option. What will be the next hurdle?
Turns out that driving is hard for computers. It's going to be a long time before anything approaching a general purpose (Level 4 or 5) system is available for all kinds of roads.
In the meantime, expect to see a number of demonstration projects in very restricted areas (or easy domains, like freeway driving only).
Also expect to see a number of Level 3 systems crash and burn because the whole idea of the computer handing off to a human, over a short time like a few seconds, can't work. For a person to develop situational awareness takes too long, unless somehow the computer can decide it needs help long before the critical situation arises (imo Level 3 should never be allowed at all).
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday July 22 2020, @03:10PM (1 child)
Would a self driving car recognize a person as an obstacle to be avoided (or alternately hit) if the person were wearing an unusual costume?
Like a gorilla, banana, or rabbit.
New bumper sticker idea (original) (for Eric Cartman maybe): I break fur animals
Is there a chemotherapy treatment for excessively low blood alcohol level?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 23 2020, @01:41AM
> if the person were wearing an unusual costume?
From what I've read, the likely answer is that the computer would not recognize a person if they were wearing a costume. My guess is a person wearing sandwich boards (advertising) also stands a good chance of not being recognized.
Just adding some specific graffiti to a street sign was enough to foul up the image recognition (at least in one case that was reported).
The currently popular flavor of AI is looking a lot less "I" as time goes on.
(Score: 2) by jmichaelhudsondotnet on Wednesday July 22 2020, @06:25PM
So a paper bag on the road, how does anyone know what is in it without looking?
Like the salt around the AI car which convinced it that it cant leave the circle, put 20 empty paper bags around the car, it wont know they are empty.
When I see a "paper bag sized object" on the "road", I have to assume it is full of something that might damage my car, I can never really assume it is empty.
I do not see how "shaking" laser transducers would ever change this equation.
At some point there will be a baby in the bag, and the car will hit it, and who will be responsible?
As our system currently functions no one, and it wouldnt make a difference if the baby was just sitting there and the tesla hit it.
To me this entire self driving car project is a coverup for autonomous weapon development. The civilian application will never work, robocars will always run over poor people, and rich people will always point fingers at the engineers, driver, ceo, god, and people will be murdered by....nothing...and no one will be punished.
This is similar to the drone situation, where rich countries murder bystanders. No witnesses, no lawyers, no judges, no courts, no historical record.
I see it far more likely, at least at this rate, these lidar advances like this will identify that there is a baby in the bag that needs to be exterminated for long term skynet survival, a lot sooner than it will do anything to save such poorly placed babies and improve the efficiency of modern driving.
The skynet future is looking more and more likely by the second.
Thesesystemsarefailing.net