Team Gray to Demonstrate Flexibility of AVS™ at Urban Challenge

An effective autonomous vehicle must simultaneously perform a variety of diverse tasks with a high degree of safety and reliability. First, it must sense and understand the environment in which it operates. Second, it must remain constantly aware of its location within that environment and be able to navigate to its assigned destination upon command. Third, it must sense any obstacles in its path and take appropriate action to avoid them. Fourth, within the context of applicable traffic rules, it must actuate all of the vehicle systems necessary to complete that mission without allowing damage to itself or other vehicles, while ensuring the safety of pedestrians and avoiding obstacles within that environment.

To sense and understand the environment in which it operates, the AVS employs two pairs of Ibeo Alasca sensors, each capable of sweeping a 270 degree arc accurate to a range of 200 meters. This provides a full 360 degree sensing of the operating environment.

To know its location within the environment, AVS relies upon an Oxford 3100 series navigation unit. This unit combines a high precision GPS system with an Inertial Navigation System. The dual antennas feeding the system, when combined with Omnistar HP differential GPS corrections, provides accuracy to within 10 centimeters. Should GPS signal be lost, the system will continue to navigate relying upon its inertial navigation system until satellite signal is reacquired.

Actuation of vehicle systems is accomplished through an installed suite of proven EMC actuators backed up by the quadruple redundancy of the AEVIT controller system. This system is DOT approved and commercially available for use in vehicles for drivers with physical disabilities. The DARPA 2005 Grand Challenge proved the viability and excellence of this system as a platform for autonomous vehicles.

The processing power to integrate the environmental and positional inputs, plot the necessary course to be driven, and actuate the vehicle control system to drive the course comes from GrayMatter's AVS™. This system, which incorporates proprietary software and commercially available hardware is far more compact and power efficient than previous iterations. The system incorporates a programmable gate array that monitors the system and shuts it down should anything compromise its overall safety. A proprietary emergency stop radio system has been interfaced to the processor system, and includes both pause and emergency shutdown modes. The system can easily be replaced by the Government supplied E-Stop system when necessary.

Team Gray is committed to winning the 2007 DARPA Urban Challenge. Stay tuned, as we will update this site regularly with our progress on meeting this new challenge

About GrayMatter, Inc.

GrayMatter, Inc. provides integrated software and hardware solutions that facilitate autonomous operation of motor vehicles. The GrayMatter AVS™ integrates with virtually any commercially available environmental sensors and GPS systems to allow the vehicle to navigate a selected route while dynamically avoiding obstacles and obeying traffic laws as would a human driver. GrayMatter was founded in 2005 to participate in the DARPA Grand Challenge, a 132 mile race across the desert in which it was the fourth-finishing team, and was semi-finalist in the 2007 Urban Challenge. For additional information, navigate to www.graymatterinc.com.