KEY POINTS:
Cars with Volkswagen and General Motors decals were the first to finish the final of the US Defence Department's Urban Challenge, a six-hour, 100km course for driverless cars using only onboard computers and equipment to plot paths and steer themselves.
Robot-steered cars sprouting racks of laser sensors and warning sirens drove through an abandoned military base neighbourhood like super-careful student drivers, coming to a complete halt before each stop sign and scrupulously trying to follow California traffic rules, but moving with the jerks and occasional ventures out of lanes of someone new to the job.
The US military sponsored the race, the third in a four-year series, as part of its efforts to replace soldiers with robots driving supply vehicles.
A 3.7m-tall green truck named TerraMax from Oshkosh Truck Corp was developed exactly for that purpose and lumbered through a series of complex manoeuvres before going off track.
But even Oshkosh sees the new technology helping in civilian life, such as searching intersections for cars headed towards the firetrucks it builds.
In interviews, most entrants focused on stopping fatalities from traffic accidents. There are 40,000 a year in the United States alone.
"What is going to change the world is interpreting sensor data and making intelligent and safe decisions," said Jesse Levinson, a PhD student from Stanford University working on his team's artificial intelligence systems.
Mr Levinson and others described the technology focus in the races, held by the Defence Department's Defence Advanced Research Projects agency, known as Darpa, as moving from hardware to artificial intelligence.
Products nearest completion are based on work in earlier races, such as Gray Matter's driver in a box - a computer that will drive a car without making complex decisions.
Aiming to make inroads into the auto test market, the handful of New Orleans engineers see demand for a plug-and-play driver that can repeatedly cover the same route identically.
Advanced technology is slowly creeping into cars, handling tasks such as parking.
VW's production Passat already has a cruise control feature that can follow the car in front of it.
"We may not be far from technology assisting drivers," said Gerry Mayer, director of defence contractor Lockheed Martin's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, adding, "We're probably a long way away from full automatic."
Some of the most successful products developed in robot car races have focused on a narrow audience: robot car makers.
Laser range-finder maker Velodyne Acoustics has sold tens of its $100,000 units, which topped many finalists' cars.
VEHICLES THAT GUIDE THEMSELVES
* Pose technical and social challenges.
* The technical problems cover design of the sensors and control systems required to make such a car work.
* Socially, it is a big ask getting people to trust the car, persuading lawmakers to allow driverless vehicles on to public roads and solving liability issues for mishaps without someone behind the wheel.
- Reuters
