Let’s face it, even self-driving cars have trouble in bad weather or near zero visibility, but that could change with the introduction of smart roads. Researchers from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Western Michigan University have developed such a roadway with pavement markers that transmit lane information to vehicles.
This technology is in the process of being commercialized by the research team, which basically equips raised pavement markers with microchips to transmit information about the shape of the road, even when cameras are unreliable because of weather conditions such as fog or snow. It also aims to reduce navigational power consumption so electric vehicles can travel farther before recharging.
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A study found the chip-enabled markers were entirely successful at transmitting lane information on a variety of routes compared to a commercial vision processing system, which detected lanes on steep curves only 7% of the time,” said the researchers.
