DARPA Chooses Teams for Robot Challenge

LOS ANGELES -- The winners of last year's Pentagon-sponsored robot race are back to take on another challenge _ this time to develop a vehicle that can drive through congested city traffic all by itself.

Stanford University, whose unmanned Volkswagen dubbed Stanley won last year's desert race, was among 11 teams selected Monday to receive government money to participate in a contest requiring robots to carry out a simulated military supply mission.
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The competition, slated to take place in a yet-undisclosed location in November 2007, is supported by the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, to spur development of military vehicles that could fight in war zones without any sort of remote control.
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Last year, DARPA awarded a $2 million winner-take-all prize to Stanford, which beat out a field of 23 vehicles by traversing 132 miles of the Mojave Desert.

DARPA's inaugural contest in 2004 ended without a winner when all the entrants broke down before the finish line.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/03/AR2006100301386.html

...but I STILL think this level of robotics control is pretty cool. This could also be the progenitor of robotic vehicles that mine the asteroid belt.