Self-driving car
[4][5] Self-driving cars are responsible for all driving activities, such as perceiving the environment, monitoring important systems, and controlling the vehicle, which includes navigating from origin to destination.
[44] In March 2021, Honda began leasing in Japan a limited edition of 100 Legend Hybrid EX sedans equipped with Level 3 "Traffic Jam Pilot" driving technology, which legally allowed drivers to take their eyes off the road when the car was travelling under 30 kilometres per hour (19 mph).
[71] The Union of Concerned Scientists defined self-driving as "cars or trucks in which human drivers are never required to take control to safely operate the vehicle.
[89][90] Mobileye CEO Amnon Shashua and CTO Shai Shalev-Shwartz proposed an alternative taxonomy for autonomous driving systems, claiming that a more consumer-friendly approach was needed.
[93][94][95][96] The first level, hands-on/eyes-on, implies that the driver is fully engaged in operating the vehicle, but is supervised by the system, which intervenes according to the features it supports (e.g., adaptive cruise control, automatic emergency braking).
Eyes-off requires that no errors be reproducible (not triggered by exotic transitory conditions) or frequent, that speeds are contextually appropriate (e.g., 80 mph on limited-access roads), and that the system handle typical maneuvers (e.g., getting cut off by another vehicle).
[92] A critical requirement for the higher two levels is that the vehicle be able to conduct a Minimum Risk Maneuver and stop safely out of traffic without driver intervention.
[102] Researchers at the MITComputer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) developed a system called MapLite, which allows self-driving cars to drive with simple maps.
After experimenting with radar and ultrasound, Tesla adopted a vision-only approach, asserting that humans drive using only vision, and that cars should be able to do the same, while citing the lower cost of cameras versus other sensor types.
[116] Drive by wire is the use of electrical or electro-mechanical systems for performing vehicle functions such as steering or speed control that are traditionally achieved by mechanical linkages.
[122] International standards have been developed for ADAS functions, connectivity, human interaction, in-vehicle systems, management/engineering, dynamic map and positioning, privacy and security.
[128] Artificial intelligence (AI) plays a pivotal role in the development and operation of autonomous vehicles (AVs), enabling them to perceive their surroundings, make decisions, and navigate safely without human intervention.
AI algorithms empower AVs to interpret sensory data from various onboard sensors, such as cameras, LiDAR, radar, and GPS, to understand their environment and improve its technological ability and overall safety over time.
[129] The primary obstacle to ACs is the advanced software and mapping required to make them work safely across the wide variety of conditions that drivers experience.
[152][153][154] In 2021 the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) accused Chinese security officials of coordinating a hacking campaign to steal information from government entities, including research related to autonomous vehicles.
[177] The prominence of certain demographic groups within the tech industry inevitably shapes the trajectory of autonomous vehicle (AV) development, potentially perpetuating existing inequalities.
[178] Research from Georgia Tech revealed that autonomous vehicle detection systems were generally five percent less effective at recognizing darker-skinned individuals.
[181] Some ACs require an internet connection to function, opening the possibility that a hacker might gain access to private information such as destinations, routes, camera recordings, media preferences, and/or behavioral patterns, although this is true of an internet-connected device.
[212] In September 2022, Biprogy released Driving Intelligence Validation Platform (DIVP) as part of Japanese national project "SIP-adus", which is interoperable with Open Simulation Interface (OSI) of ASAM.
[229] In February 2025, a Tesla Cybertruck crashed while in Full-Self Driving mode, raising concerns about autonomous driving and prompting an investigation from Tesla who said the crash would be probed "“in line with standard protocol when any of our electric vehicles are involved in an accident while in FSD mode.”[230][231] In June 2015, Google confirmed that 12 vehicles had suffered collisions as of that date.
[238] Arizona governor Doug Ducey suspended the company's ability to test its ACs citing an "unquestionable failure" of Uber to protect public safety.
[249] In April 2022, Cruise's testing vehicle was reported to have blocked a fire engine on emergency call, and sparked questions about its ability to handle unexpected circumstances.
[252] In March 2024, a drunk driver who was speeding, holding her cell phone, and using BlueCruise on a Pennsylvania freeway struck and killed two people who had been driving two cars.
[262] In 2016, a survey of 1,603 people in Germany that controlled for age, gender, and education reported that men felt less anxiety and more enthusiasm, whereas women showed the opposite.
The questionnaire was termed the autonomous vehicle acceptance model (AVAM), including additional description to help respondents better understand the implications of various automation levels.
[267] In 2024, a study by Saravanos et al.[268] at New York University reported that 87% of their respondents (from a sample of 358) believed that conditionally automated cars (at Level 3) would be easy to use.
[276][277] Tesla's FSD rewrite V12 (released in March 2024) uses a single deep learning transformer model for all aspects of perception, monitoring, and control.
The system hardware in and around the car includes multiple cameras, short- and long-range radar, and a LiDAR sensor, and will be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon Ride Platform.
[297] Waymo offers robotaxi services in parts of Arizona (Phoenix) and California (San Francisco and Los Angeles), as fully autonomous vehicles without safety drivers.
[308] Media related to Autonomous automobiles at Wikimedia Commons These books are based on presentations and discussions at the Automated Vehicles Symposium organized annually by TRB and AUVSI.
