(October 13, Washington, Sri Lanka Guardian) The Google revolutionized the way we search online. Now the internet giant is looking to revolutionize the way we drive.

Google hooked up models of the Toyota Prius with artificial intelligence software that lets them drive themselves. “The seemingly all-conquering Google has announced that it’s road-testing cars that steer, stop and start without a driver,” Time Magazine reports. “The cars use video cameras on the roof, along with radar sensors and a laser range finder to ‘see’ other traffic.”

Driverless cars seem odd, but Google thinks they’ll be a huge benefit. “Our goal is to help prevent traffic accidents, free up people’s time and reduce carbon emissions by fundamentally changing car use,” Sebastian Thrun, a Google software engineer, states in the company blog.

So far, the new software has been successful. “With someone behind the wheel to take control if something goes awry and a technician in the passenger seat to monitor the navigation system, seven test cars have driven 1,000 miles without human intervention and more than 140,000 miles with only occasional human control,” says the New York Times. “The only accident, engineers said, was when one Google car was rear-ended while stopped at a traffic light.”

Although these cars appear safer, Jalopnik questions their legality — though admits there’s no law barring their existence. “According to California officials, there are no laws that would bar Google from testing such models, as long as there’s a human behind the wheel who would be responsible should something go wrong,” writes Jalopnik.

Californian drivers may spot a Google Prius on the road, but if you live elsewhere, it’ll be a long time before you see a motorist reading behind the wheel while their car drives.

Before you shop, make sure you check out the U.S. News rankings of this year’s best cars. Also, be sure to check us out on Twitter to stay on top of the latest car discounts and incentives.

Here is another article by Sebastian Thrun, Distinguished Software Engineer on the Google Car

What we’re driving at

Larry and Sergey founded Google because they wanted to help solve really big problems using technology. And one of the big problems we’re working on today is car safety and efficiency. Our goal is to help prevent traffic accidents, free up people’s time and reduce carbon emissions by fundamentally changing car use.

So we have developed technology for cars that can drive themselves. Our automated cars, manned by trained operators, just drove from our Mountain View campus to our Santa Monica office and on to Hollywood Boulevard. They’ve driven down Lombard Street, crossed the Golden Gate bridge, navigated the Pacific Coast Highway, and even made it all the way around Lake Tahoe. All in all, our self-driving cars have logged over 140,000 miles. We think this is a first in robotics research.

Our automated cars use video cameras, radar sensors and a laser range finder to “see” other traffic, as well as detailed maps (which we collect using manually driven vehicles) to navigate the road ahead. This is all made possible by Google’s data centers, which can process the enormous amounts of information gathered by our cars when mapping their terrain.

To develop this technology, we gathered some of the very best engineers from the DARPA Challenges, a series of autonomous vehicle races organized by the U.S. Government. Chris Urmson was the technical team leader of the CMU team that won the 2007 Urban Challenge. Mike Montemerlo was the software lead for the Stanford team that won the 2005 Grand Challenge. Also on the team is Anthony Levandowski, who built the world’s first autonomous motorcycle that participated in a DARPA Grand Challenge, and who also built a modified Prius that delivered pizza without a person inside. The work of these and other engineers on the team is on display in the National Museum of American History.

Safety has been our first priority in this project. Our cars are never unmanned. We always have a trained safety driver behind the wheel who can take over as easily as one disengages cruise control. And we also have a trained software operator in the passenger seat to monitor the software. Any test begins by sending out a driver in a conventionally driven car to map the route and road conditions. By mapping features like lane markers and traffic signs, the software in the car becomes familiar with the environment and its characteristics in advance. And we’ve briefed local police on our work.

According to the World Health Organization, more than 1.2 million lives are lost every year in road traffic accidents. We believe our technology has the potential to cut that number, perhaps by as much as half. We’re also confident that self-driving cars will transform car sharing, significantly reducing car usage, as well as help create the new “highway trains of tomorrow.” These highway trains should cut energy consumption while also increasing the number of people that can be transported on our major roads. In terms of time efficiency, the U.S. Department of Transportation estimates that people spend on average 52 minutes each working day commuting. Imagine being able to spend that time more productively.

We’ve always been optimistic about technology’s ability to advance society, which is why we have pushed so hard to improve the capabilities of self-driving cars beyond where they are today. While this project is very much in the experimental stage, it provides a glimpse of what transportation might look like in the future thanks to advanced computer science. And that future is very exciting.