DARPA Grand Challenge

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The DARPA Grand Challenge is a United States government-sponsored competition that aims to create the first fully autonomous vehicles capable of competing on an under-300 mile, off-road course in the Mojave Desert in the Southwest United States. This annual challenge took place for the first time on March 13, 2004 and was sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) of the U.S. Department of Defense.

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History

This was the first such distance competition in the United States; to date, there have been other competitions for semi-autonomous vehicles, but none on the scale of the Grand Challenge. The U.S. Department of Defense has permitted DARPA to offer prize money ($1 million) to facilitate robotic development, with the ultimate goal of making one third of ground military forces automated by 2015. Following the 2004 event, Dr. Tony Tether, the director of DARPA, announced that the prize money had been increased to $2 million for the next event, which was claimed on October 9, 2005.

The competition was open to all U.S. citizens and organizations, including high school and college students, businesses and other organizations. More than 100 teams registered in the first year, bringing a wide variety of technological skills to the race. In the second year, 195 teams from 36 states and 4 foreign countries entered the race.

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2004 Grand Challenge

Template:Main In the 2004 DARPA Grand Challenge, none of the robot vehicles came even close to meeting the challenge. Carnegie Mellon's Red Team travelled the farthest distance, completing 7.4 miles of the course.

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2005 Grand Challenge

Template:Main The 2005 Grand Challenge began at 6:40am on October 8, 2005. This time "Stanley", the robotic Volkswagen Touareg of "The Stanford Racing Team", beat the field—completing the 132-mile race with a winning time of 6 hours 53 minutes and 58 seconds. Four other vehicles successfully completed the race. These were 2nd place: CMU's Sandstorm at 7hr 4m; 3rd place: CMU's Highlander at 7hr 14m; 4th place: Gray Team's Kat-5 at 7hr 30m and finally, not within the 10 hour time limit but 5th place: TerraMax at 12hr 51m. All but one of the 23 finalists in the 2005 race surpassed the 7.36 mile distance completed by the best vehicle in the 2004 race.

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2007 Grand Challenge

In December 2005, DARPA published a questionnaire indicating that DARPA was considering another Grand Challenge for autonomous vehicles operating in an urban area. On February 22, 2006, DARPA sent out an email indicating that it was considering two different possible formats for the hypothetical 2007 Grand Challenge (Urban Challenge). Format A would consist of a similar rule set to the previous Grand Challenges, but would have a more lucrative prize structure that paid the top three finishers and all semifinalists. Format B would consist of up to 10 teams that would receive 1 million in funding, then compete in a Grand Challenge for an additional 1 million dollar prize. Format B also would remove the rule that no government funding is allowed.

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Basic Rules

  • The vehicle must travel autonomously on the ground in under ten hours.
  • The vehicle must stay within the course boundaries as defined by a data file provided by DARPA.
  • The vehicle may use GPS and other public signals.
  • No control commands may be sent to the vehicle while en route.
  • The vehicle must not intentionally touch any other competing vehicle.

DARPA is conducting this challenge in association with SCORE International Off-Road Racing.

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See also

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External links

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Official Sites

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Team Sites

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TV Specials

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