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The VaMP
driverless car A self-driving car, also known as an autonomous car, driver-less car, or robotic car (robo-car), is a car that is capable of traveling without human input.Xie, S.; Hu, J.; Bhowmick, P.; Ding, Z.; Arvin, F.,Distributed Motion Planning for S ...
was one of the first truly
autonomous In developmental psychology and moral, political, and bioethical philosophy, autonomy, from , ''autonomos'', from αὐτο- ''auto-'' "self" and νόμος ''nomos'', "law", hence when combined understood to mean "one who gives oneself one's ow ...
cars Dynamic Vision for Perception and Control of Motion
a 2007 book by Ernst D. Dickmanns along with its twin vehicle, the VITA-2. They were able to drive in heavy traffic for long distances without human intervention, using
computer vision Computer vision is an interdisciplinary scientific field that deals with how computers can gain high-level understanding from digital images or videos. From the perspective of engineering, it seeks to understand and automate tasks that the hum ...
to recognize rapidly moving obstacles such as other cars, and automatically avoid and pass them. The VaMP was constructed by the team of
Ernst Dickmanns Ernst Dieter Dickmanns is a German pioneer of dynamic computer vision and of driverless cars. Dickmanns has been a professor at Bundeswehr University Munich (1975–2001), and visiting professor to Caltech and to MIT, teaching courses on "dynamic ...
at the
Bundeswehr University of Munich 200px, Entrance to the university Bundeswehr University Munich (german: Universität der Bundeswehr München, UniBw München) is one of two research universities in Germany at federal level that both were founded in 1973 as part of the German Ar ...
and
Mercedes-Benz Mercedes-Benz (), commonly referred to as Mercedes and sometimes as Benz, is a German luxury and commercial vehicle automotive brand established in 1926. Mercedes-Benz AG (a Mercedes-Benz Group subsidiary established in 2019) is headquartere ...
in the 1990s as part of the 800 million ECU EUREKA Prometheus Project on autonomous vehicles (1987–1995). It was a 500 SEL Mercedes re-engineered such that it was possible to control
steering wheel A steering wheel (also called a driving wheel (UK), a hand wheel, or simply wheel) is a type of steering control in vehicles. Steering wheels are used in most modern land vehicles, including all mass-production automobiles, buses, light and ...
,
throttle A throttle is the mechanism by which fluid flow is managed by constriction or obstruction. An engine's power can be increased or decreased by the restriction of inlet gases (by the use of a throttle), but usually decreased. The term ''throttle'' ...
, and
brake A brake is a mechanical device that inhibits motion by absorbing energy from a moving system. It is used for slowing or stopping a moving vehicle, wheel, axle, or to prevent its motion, most often accomplished by means of friction. Background ...
s through
computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...
commands based on real-time evaluation of image sequences.
Software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...
was written that translated sensory data into appropriate driving commands. Due to the limited computing power of the time period, sophisticated
computer vision Computer vision is an interdisciplinary scientific field that deals with how computers can gain high-level understanding from digital images or videos. From the perspective of engineering, it seeks to understand and automate tasks that the hum ...
strategies were necessary to react in real time. The Dickmanns team solved the problem through an innovative approach to dynamic computer vision. Attention control including artificial
saccadic A saccade ( , French for ''jerk'') is a quick, simultaneous movement of both eyes between two or more phases of fixation in the same direction.Cassin, B. and Solomon, S. ''Dictionary of Eye Terminology''. Gainesville, Florida: Triad Publishi ...
movements of the platform carrying the cameras allowed the system to focus its attention on the most relevant details of the visual input. Four cameras with two different focal lengths for each hemisphere were used in parallel for this purpose.
Kalman filter For statistics and control theory, Kalman filtering, also known as linear quadratic estimation (LQE), is an algorithm that uses a series of measurements observed over time, including statistical noise and other inaccuracies, and produces estimat ...
s were extended to handle perspective imaging and to achieve robust autonomous driving even in the presence of
noise Noise is unwanted sound considered unpleasant, loud or disruptive to hearing. From a physics standpoint, there is no distinction between noise and desired sound, as both are vibrations through a medium, such as air or water. The difference arise ...
and
uncertainty Uncertainty refers to epistemic situations involving imperfect or unknown information. It applies to predictions of future events, to physical measurements that are already made, or to the unknown. Uncertainty arises in partially observable or ...
. Sixty
transputer The transputer is a series of pioneering microprocessors from the 1980s, intended for parallel computing. To support this, each transputer had its own integrated memory and serial communication links to exchange data with other transputers. T ...
s, a type of
parallel computer Parallel computing is a type of computation in which many calculations or processes are carried out simultaneously. Large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which can then be solved at the same time. There are several different for ...
s, were used to deal with the enormous (by 1990s standards) computational demands. In 1994, the VaMP and its twin VITA-2 were stars of the final international presentation of the PROMETHEUS project in October 1994 on Autoroute 1 near the Charles-de-Gaulle airport in
Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
. With a safety driver and guests on board, the twins drove more than in normal
traffic Traffic comprises pedestrians, vehicles, ridden or herded animals, trains, and other conveyances that use public ways (roads) for travel and transportation. Traffic laws govern and regulate traffic, while rules of the road include traffic ...
on the three-lane highway at speeds up to . They demonstrated lane changes left and right, autonomously passing other cars after maneuver approval by the safety driver. One year later, the autonomous Mercedes-Benz drove more than from Munich to
Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...
and back in traffic at up to , again planning and executing maneuvers to pass other cars with safety driver approval. However, only in a few critical situations (such as unmodeled construction areas) a safety driver took over completely. Again, active computer vision was used to deal with rapidly changing street scenes. The car achieved speeds exceeding on the
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...
Autobahn The (; German plural ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official German term is (abbreviated ''BAB''), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word is 'Federal Auto(mobile) Track'. ...
, with a
mean There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value (magnitude and sign) of a given data set. For a data set, the ''arithme ...
distance between human interventions of . Despite being a research system without emphasis on long distance reliability, it drove up to without any human intervention. Most current robot cars as well as commercial vehicles with driver assistance use
GPS The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a Radionavigation-satellite service, satellite-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Space Force. It is one of t ...
so that they know precisely where they are. However, the VaMP did not use GPS, and relied on vision only. The VaMP and VITA-2 projects pioneered many hardware and software concepts that are essential for autonomous robots. They left a big impression on many observers and heavily influenced robot car research and funding decisions worldwide. Since May 2006, VaMP is on display at the
Deutsches Museum The Deutsches Museum (''German Museum'', officially (English: ''German Museum of Masterpieces of Science and Technology'')) in Munich, Germany, is the world's largest museum of science and technology, with about 28,000 exhibited objects from ...
in
Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...
,
Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
.


See also

*
Driverless car A self-driving car, also known as an autonomous car, driver-less car, or robotic car (robo-car), is a car that is capable of traveling without human input.Xie, S.; Hu, J.; Bhowmick, P.; Ding, Z.; Arvin, F.,Distributed Motion Planning for S ...
*
VIAC VIAC, the VisLab Intercontinental Autonomous Challenge, is the challenge conceived by VisLab as an extreme test of autonomous vehicles. It ran from July 20, 2010 to October 28, 2010, involving four driverless vehicles driving with virtually no ...
the Intercontinental Autonomous Challenge of 2010 * EUREKA Prometheus Project *
DARPA Grand Challenge The DARPA Grand Challenge is a prize competition for American autonomous vehicles, funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the most prominent research organization of the United States Department of Defense. Congress has authorize ...
*
ELROB The European Land-Robot Trial (ELROB) is a European event which demonstrates the abilities of modern robots. The ELROB is not a competition, like the US DARPA Grand Challenge, but a pure demonstration of what European robotics is able to achieve ...
trials


References

{{Autonomous cars and enabling technologies Experimental self-driving cars