Ford will team with MIT and Stanford to try to figure out how to give self-driving, or automated, cars “intuition”. The Stanford research will examine how a car’s LiDAR infrared sensors could see around obstacles. Similar to the way a bat or dolphin uses sound waves, LiDAR bounces infrared light off of objects up to 200 feet away and then uses the data to create a real-time 3-D map of the vicinity.
The dream of putting self–driving cars on the road is generally associated with Google and its X Lab. But Ford has just announced a partnership with two academic brain trusts that could put the automaker on a competitive footing with the search giant. Ford will partner with MIT and Stanford University to focus on surmounting some of the challenges related to bringing self-driving cars to the masses. “Working with university partners like MIT and Stanford enables us to address some of the longer-term challenges surrounding automated driving while exploring more near-term solutions for delivering an even safer and more efficient driving experience,” said Paul Mascarenas, chief technical officer and vice president of Ford Research and Innovation, in a statement.