Ars at CES 2013

Lexus highlights autonomous, “perceiving” car to reduce on-road fatalities

Company says cars that can sense their surroundings will crash less, save lives.

Lexus has long had a fascination with self-driving cars—their participation in the near-future movie Minority Report was well-publicized—but their focus at CES isn't on self-driving cars as an end in and of themselves. Rather, the company set its sights on how pulling more smarts and sensors into a car can help reduce on-road fatalities.

This afternoon, Lexus showed off its Advanced Active Safety Research Vehicle, a heavily modified and be-sensored LS 600hL, and discussed the "layered introduction" of autonomous driving technologies. The company was quick to emphasize that "autonomous" doesn't necessarily mean "driverless," however. Even with states like California passing legislation to legalize and regulate self-driving cars, there are huge acceptance and trust issues with letting them roam around the roadways without a person at the helm.

Enlarge / Lexus's Advanced Active Safety Research Vehicle. It's looking at you right now.
Lee Hutchinson

Rather than tackle that immediately, Lexus (and its parent company Toyota) intend to gradually move in that direction by adding technology to enhance and augment a driver's abilities. The Advanced Active Safety Research Vehicle is a huge part of that.

Enlarge / The research vehicle features a bevy of bow-mounted stereoscopic sensors.
Lee Hutchinson
Enlarge / More sensors, including a LIDAR suite, live on the roof.
Lee Hutchinson

The Lexus 2013 LS 600h luxury coupe (which our own intrepid reporters Casey Johnston and Andrew Cunningham tested last month) already incorporates a pretty significant amount of autonomous technology. The car has millimeter-wave RADAR, stereo cameras, and near-infrared projectors and receivers to give the car insight into where things are around it. The external sensors make the car aware of the position, speed, and trajectory of everything around it, and they're tied into internal collision avoidance or mitigation systems. When the car detects that a collision is imminent, it can alert the driver through audio and visual means. But it can also take action on its own, stiffening the shocks and suspension, activating seat belt pre-tensioners, and applying its brakes.

Enlarge / A standard LS 600h L was also on display. Still stuffed with sensors and smarts, though.
Lee Hutchinson

This is state of the art today, but Toyota and Lexus want to take it further. By coupling the advanced research vehicle with a simulated urban proving ground, the duo is researching how better to meld together the vehicle to the driver, the vehicle to other vehicles, and the vehicle to the environment around it. The advanced research vehicle incorporates far more sensors than the production cars, including a roof-mounted LIDAR system for observing and navigating through its surroundings. The ultimate goal is to produce a system that perceives its surroundings and can react to them, offering input into the most efficient and safe way to get to its destination.

Lexus was quick to emphasize the goal of all of this isn't only to produce a car that zooms around on its own, but to produce one that does so safely and whose existence and function reduces the number of people killed on roads. A car that drives its own would be a neat side-effect, but the point is to help drivers live longer.

"Right now, machines can handle simple tasks—parking, following traffic, staying in a lane. We need them to do more," explained Mark Templin, Toyota vice president and general manager of Toyota's Lexus division. There was not a time given as to when this might happen, and Templin was clear to point out the research vehicle shown today is just that—a research vehicle. Still, Minority Report might not be that far away—not just the precog part, but the self-driving car part, too.

Listing image by Lee Hutchinson

Expand full story

You must to comment.