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Category: transportation

At the Frankfurt Motor Show (IAA Cars 2017) in Germany earlier this week, Samsung SDI — the battery-focused division of Samsung — unveiled a new multi-functional battery pack capable of increasing the current range of electric vehicles. As explained by the Korean company, the battery enables cars to go between 600–700 kilometers (372−4343 miles), provided the right number of modules are installed.

“Its users can change the number of modules as they want as if they place books on a shelf,” says Samsung. “For example, if 20 modules are installed in a premium car, it can go 600 to 700 kilometers. If 10 to 12 modules are mounted on a regular sedan, it can run up to 300 kilometers. This pack is expected to catch the eyes of automakers, because they can design a car whose mileage may vary depending on how many modules of a single pack are installed.”

Electrek explains that automakers like Nissan and GM have been using prismatic cells in their battery packs. Samsung SDI began developing new “2170” cylindrical cells earlier this year, following the footsteps of Tesla, which was the first to do so with their “2170” battery cell.

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Today, U.S. Depart of Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao released the DoT and National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration’s new guidelines for automated driving systems. This is version 2.0 of a federal policy on self-driving cars, and Chao said it’s a “living document,” with plans already for version 3.0 to arrive in 2018.

These guidelines are called “A Vision for Safety 2.0,” which Chao says reflects their importance in terms of addressing the rising rate of traffic deaths in the U.S. Chao cited the most recent stats, which include the stat that 94 percent of serious motor vehicle accidents in the U.S. are due to human error, in presenting the new guidelines at an event today.

The new guidelines are designed to unify development of automation features, including full autonomy and advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), and to help unify industry, local, state and federal government efforts to that end. It’s voluntary guidance, but it focuses on SAE Levels 3 through 5 automation, and it clarifies that companies don’t need to wait to begin testing and deploying their automated driving systems, and streamlines the self-assessment process for companies and organizations.

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Andrew Ng, one of the world’s best-known artificial-intelligence experts, is launching an online effort to create millions more AI experts across a range of industries. Ng, an early pioneer in online learning, hopes his new deep-learning course on Coursera will train people to use the most powerful idea to have emerged in AI in recent years.

Millions of people should master deep learning, says a leading AI researcher and educator.

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Jianxiong Xiao aims to make self-driving cars as widely accessible as computers are today. He’s the founder and CEO of AutoX, which recently demonstrated an autonomous car built not with expensive laser sensors but with ordinary webcams and some sophisticated computer-vision algorithms. Remarkably, the vehicle can navigate even at night and in bad weather.

AutoX hasn’t revealed details of its software, but Xiao is an expert at using deep learning, an AI technique that lets machines teach themselves to perform difficult tasks such as recognizing pedestrians from different angles and in different lighting.

Growing up without much money in Chaozhou, a city in eastern China, Xiao became mesmerized by books about computers—fantastic-sounding machines that could encode knowledge, logic, and reason. Without access to the real thing, he taught himself to touch-type on a keyboard drawn on paper.

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The steering wheel as we know it doesn’t have a bright future — in fact, it might disappear altogether as self-driving cars hit the road. Jaguar Land Rover, however, has an idea as to how it might survive. The British automaker has unveiled a concept steering wheel, Sayer, that’s designed for an era where cars normally drive themselves and personal ownership is a thing of the past. The wheel would have its own AI system, and would follow you from car to car — you’d just hook it in to bring your experience with you.

The AI would largely serve as a concierge. It would link you to an on-demand service club, whether or not you own your car, and would help you get a ride when and where you need it. If there’s a must-attend meeting, for example, you could tell the wheel while it’s still in your living room and it would figure out when a car needs to arrive and tell you when you might want to take control.

Sayer (named after influential designer Malcolm Sayer) will be a core feature on an upcoming concept car, the Future-Type.

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How dumb AI came to run the world

“People are becoming trained to just blindly follow their mapping apps. The concern is the apps aren’t making any distinction between what happens when cars travel on highways and when they travel on city streets by schools and through neighborhoods,” says Hans Larsen, public works director in Fremont, California, a San Francisco Bay area suburb on the fringes of Silicon Valley.”

“The traffic being diverted off clogged highways during the morning and evening commutes became so insufferable in Fremont that city leaders decided about a year ago to try to outwit the apps. The city of about 230,000 people started to ban turns at several key intersections at certain times along the shortcuts being touted by Waze and other mapping services.”

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