Making the right robot for the right job

Within a decade cars could start driving themselves on highways and in less than 25 years automakers may be producing vehicles "smart" enough to chauffeur passengers through city streets, Stanford computer scientist Sebastian Thrun predicted Saturday in San Francisco.

Thrun, who led the winning team in a robotic car race sponsored by the Pentagon in 2005, was one of four experts who spoke about the current and future state of robotics at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The association today wraps up a five-day event that attracted researchers from 60 countries to explore many fields including robotics.

As Saturday's talks revealed, the convergence of key technologies hint that, within decades, robots may be able to perform tasks that were hitherto only fiction. These advances include:

• cheap, effective sensors that substitute for biological senses;
• sophisticated software and computers that approximate nerves and brains; and
• the ability to manufacture tiny mechanisms to mimic muscles.

Thrun's robotic car is a prime example of the first two trends. His vehicle is a Volkswagen that is essentially the same as any driver-operated car. His task is to marry sensing systems placed atop the vehicle -- they resemble the lights on a police car -- with software being written by his Stanford collaborator Mike Montemerlo.

From JFKLaw