Tag Archives: UniversidadCarlosIiiDeMadrid

New in-car GPS tech uses motion sensors for accurate, autonomous city driving

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New incar GPS tech could wield motion sensors for extraaccurate city driving

In-car GPS developers have long had to wrestle with the urban canyon effect that blocks or bounces signals downtown: they often have to make best guesses for accuracy when they can't count on cellular or WiFi triangulation to pick up the slack, like a smartphone would. The Universidad Carlos III de Madrid has nonetheless found a way to borrow a page from mobile devices to get that accuracy back. By supplementing the GPS data with accelerometers and gyroscopes, researchers can use direction changes and speed to fill in the blanks, improving accuracy from a crude-at-best 49 feet to between 3 and 7 feet. The University's creation doesn't just minimize the chance of a wrong turn; it could be key to intelligent or driverless cars that have to perform sudden maneuvers all on their own. While the enhanced system is just a prototype without a commercialization schedule, it already slots into just about any car, including the University's own intelligent car prototype (not pictured here). We may no longer have to lump car GPS units into the same "close is good enough" category as horseshoes and hand grenades.

[Image credit: Steve Jurvetson, Flickr]

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Via: BBC

Source: Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

Spanish researchers to train FIFA referees on calling plays with stereoscopic 3D, won’t help catch dives

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Spanish researchers to train FIFA referees on calling plays, sadly won't catch dives

Spain might be on Cloud Nine after clinching victory in UEFA's Euro 2012, but a team at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid isn't resting easy. To help referees know when they should blow the whistle, researchers have recorded 500 simulated offside soccer (yes, football) plays in stereoscopic 3D to give refs a more immersive sense of what it's like to make the call on the pitch. The hope is to have FIFA more quickly and accurately stopping play without having to spend too much actual time on the grass. We don't yet know how many referees if any will be trained on the system by the 2014 World Cup, or if it will spread to other leagues -- what we do know is that no amount of extra immersion is needed to catch a theatrically fake injury.

Spanish researchers to train FIFA referees on calling plays with stereoscopic 3D, won't help catch dives originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 03 Jul 2012 23:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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