VIAC, the VisLab Intercontinental Autonomous Challenge, is the challenge conceived by

VisLab VisLab is an Italian company working on computer vision and environmental perception for vehicular applications. It was founded in the early 90s as a research laboratory at University of Parma. It started its activities in 1990, with its invo ...

as an extreme test of

autonomous vehicles Vehicular automation involves the use of mechatronics, artificial intelligence, and multi-agent systems to assist the operator of a vehicle (car, aircraft, watercraft, or otherwise).Hu, J.; Bhowmick, P.; Lanzon, A.,Group Coordinated Control o ...

. It ran from July 20, 2010 to October 28, 2010, involving four driverless vehicles driving with virtually no human intervention on an almost trip from

Parma Parma (; egl, Pärma, ) is a city in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna known for its architecture, music, art, prosciutto (ham), cheese and surrounding countryside. With a population of 198,292 inhabitants, Parma is the second mos ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

, China."Without driver or map, vans go from Italy to China"
Elaine Kurtenbac, AP.COM
Jo Ling Kent, CNN.COM

Overview

The

2010 World Expo Expo 2010, officially the Expo 2010 Shanghai China, was held on both banks of the Huangpu River in Shanghai, China, from 1 May to 31 October 2010. It was a major World Expo registered by the Bureau International des Expositions (BIE), in the t ...

's theme was “better cities, better life”; therefore issues related to sustainable mobility were central to the Expo and this challenge of reaching Shanghai with driverless vehicles provided a clear demonstration of future vehicles; it is considered one of the main milestones in

Robotics Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrate ...

, thanks to a project partially funded by ERC -the European Research Council- showed that one day it will be possible to move goods between two continents with non-polluting vehicles powered by green energy and with virtually no human intervention. Goods were packed in

and taken to

on driverless vehicles for the first time in history.

The idea

The aim was to test and stress the current technology in a unique event: non-polluting and non-oil based

in real traffic conditions on an extreme journey between two continents, the final outcome being a huge dataset with a very large variety of situations to be further used to refine the onboard perception system.

Technical details

The trip traversed remote areas in Russia, Kazakhstan, and China, for which no map was available; due to the length of the trip it was also impossible to check and test the route in advance. Therefore, VisLab defined the following behavior. The first vehicle drove autonomously in selected sections of the trip, conducting experimental tests on sensing, decision, and

control Control may refer to: Basic meanings Economics and business * Control (management), an element of management * Control, an element of management accounting * Comptroller (or controller), a senior financial officer in an organization * Controllin ...

subsystems, and continuously collecting data. Human interventions were needed on a regular basis to define the route and intervene in critical situations. The second vehicle automatically followed the route defined by the leader vehicle by following it either visually or thanks to GPS waypoints sent by the leader vehicle, therefore requiring no human intervention (100% autonomous). This is regarded as a readily exploitable vehicle, able to move on predefined routes. During the trip, demonstrations were scheduled in specific hot spots, showing autonomous vehicles following given routes, negotiating traffic, avoiding obstacles, and stopping when required. The first demonstration was held in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

at the EUR district on October 29, 2009, when Rome's Major, Gianni Alemanno, officially presented the VIAC challenge. The last demonstration was given exactly one year later, on Oct 28, 2010, in

, China, during a parade at the World Expo, organized by the European Pavilion. Although the vehicles were electric and had solar panels on the roof, propulsion was not powered by the solar panels but by the original vehicle's batteries which were charged at power outlets or, when no power outlet was available, by generators. The solar panels powered the autonomous driving system (sensors, processing engines, actuators, radios, GPS,..).

Worldwide Milestone and Data Analysis

The VisLab Intercontinental Autonomous Challenge is considered a unique milestone in vehicular robotics, just like the

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 authoriz ...

in 2005 and the

DARPA Urban Challenge The third driverless car competition of the DARPA Grand Challenge was commonly known as the DARPA Urban Challenge. It took place on November 3, 2007 at the site of the now-closed George Air Force Base (currently used as Southern California Logist ...

in 2007. The vehicles collected about 50 terabytes of data to be used in the future for further processing off-line.

Organization and Logistics

The logistics were managed by Overland Network, which provided 4 RVs (motor homes) and 3 additional trucks as a support. The expedition was therefore formed by 4 autonomous vehicles, 4 RVs, 3 trucks, and occupied about 20 people for three months. A satellite link broadcast live data and video streaming for the whole duration of the trip (except in China) so that everybody on the Internet was able to witness the progress of the experiment.

References

External links

* {{authority control Automotive safety University of Parma Automotive technologies Robotics competitions Self-driving cars