Geomaticians

Researchers Have Found A Way To Give Memory To Self-driving Vehicles – And It Has Opened Up A Realm Of New Possibilities

Researchers Have Found A Way To Give Memory To Self-Driving Vehicles – And It Has Opened Up A Realm Of New Possibilities

Vehicles using artificial neural networks to function do not have past memory no matter how many times they have been through that route. Researchers from Cornell University have created a way to help autonomous vehicles create “memories” of previous experiences and use them in future navigation, especially during harsh weather conditions when the vehicles cannot safely trust their sensors. The team was headed by a doctoral student Carlos Diaz-Ruiz. The group collected a dataset by driving a car equipped with LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) sensors along a 9.3-mile (15-kilometer) loop in and around Ithaca 40 times over 18 months. The traversals capture varying, weather conditions (sunny, rainy, snowy), and times of the day. As a result, 600,000 scenes were gathered.