AutonoMusings - Robotic Jellyfish, Spiders, and School Buses

By Joshua Ouellette • Issue #20 • View online

Welcome to the 20th edition of AutonoMusings!

This week, there was an unusual amount of noise coming out of the European autonomous vehicle world, while giant spider and tiny jellyfish robots remind us how much variety there can be in robotics!

- Josh

Bio-Inspired Robotics

Robo-jellyfish can safely explore ocean reefs

Researchers have developed a jellyfish-like robot that can swim among delicate coral reefs without causing harm to the ecosystem. The 8-inch jelly-bot can swim side-to-side, and navigate against the current, too, by steering itself with eight tentacles that inflate and contract by way of two battery-powered pumps. Researchers hope that future generations of the robot will be able to explore seafloor crevasses and ocean-bound oil rigs.

www.wired.com • Share

Guinness dubs six-legged walking robot the world's largest

Guinness — the declarer of world records — has proclaimed a British engineer’s ridable robotic hexapod the largest of its kind. The six-legged spider-esque contraption looks a like something born from a massive erector set, only with a cockpit for a rider to manipulate the two-ton metallic beast.

Guinness reminds you to drink responsibly and never drive your giant robot spider under the influence.

www.upi.com • Share

This Week in Autonomous Vehicles

Buckle up kids! Florida to test autonomous school shuttles

Babcock Ranch, Florida, will soon be the world’s first city to test autonomous school busses. The electric shuttles will be capable of transporting 12 children to school from a designated pickup point along a predetermined path. Eventually, the goal is for students to request on-demand door-to-door service through an app.

Combine this with the giant hexapods, and I think you have a winner!

www.curbed.com • Share

Volvo Trucks reveals all-electric tractor trailer

lvo Trucks, the world’s second-largest heavy-duty truck maker, introduced this week its AV delivery solution: the Vera, an all-electric cabless vehicle capable of pulling a trailer nearly 200 miles on a single charge.

There seems to be surprisingly little attention given to the drag coefficient of that trailer.

www.thestreet.com • Share

Fahrvergnügen! German parts supplier to jump into AV game with $14B investment

German-based auto parts supplier ZG Friedrichshafen AG is jumping into the autonomous vehicle game with a $14 billion investment over the nexts five years. The privately held company plans to have a battery-powered AV delivery van for series production by fall 2020, pitting it head-to-head against Volkswagen’s Crafter and Ford’s Transit delivery AV.

With so many companies trying to carve out a piece of the AV space, it’s not surprising to see the ecosystem of parts suppliers entering the fray.

www.bloomberg.com • Share

BMW seeks to encourage partnerships to develop AV systems

German automaker BMW plans to leverage its alliances to help control costs of the proprietary batteries that power its vehicles, while seeking partners to share the expense of developing systems for autonomous vehicles. A bonus of the latter would be the establishment of a single standard for AV systems, a desire recently expressed by Volkswagen AG as well.

It will be interesting to see how a more collaborative approach to AVs by the German automakers fairs against the much less cooperative US ecosystem.

www.reuters.com • Share

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By Joshua Ouellette

This newsletter was made with love by RavenOps in San Francisco

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