Not all the technical hurdles involve the autonomous systems, which seem well on the road to commercialization.
Critics of drones and emergent autonomous systems have all used scare tactics to generate support for their cause.
Remote or autonomous systems can collect a far greater volume of useful scientific data for far less money.
Paraswift is a research project at the Autonomous Systems Lab at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich in collaboration with Disney Research.
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Melhuish, who is director of the Intelligent Autonomous Systems Lab at the UWE, told CNN that the EcoBot II was a result of a quest for an intelligent robot that could function without human supervision.
By reducing the discussion to a simplified fear campaign aimed at stopping the development of autonomous systems, HRW may very well be preventing the deployment of systems that can be more careful and less likely to harm civilians.
But a bigger leap was just announced: The jointly funded Autonomous Systems Technology Related Airborne Evaluation and Assessment (ASTRAEA) group in the U.K. is going to begin autonomous flight trials using a 19-seat Jetstream 31 commuter aircraft.
Especially as the military looks into more remote controlled and autonomous robotics systems.
Other systems for autonomous helicopters are being developed.
Technologies being tested in the program include advanced guidance, navigation and control, thermal protection systems, avionics, high temperature structures and seals, conformal reusable insulation, lightweight electromechanical flight systems, and autonomous orbital flight, reentry and landing.
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That's why technology providers are promoting the idea of autonomous computing, a vision of systems that can monitor, administer and repair themselves.
Ground controllers will be able to monitor the telescope in real time, but the pointing systems are designed to be somewhat autonomous.
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There will be greater vulnerability with increasing numbers of intelligent systems creating more potential targets, from autonomous vehicles to smart grids.
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Government regulation and legal liability could soon become bigger obstacles to the spread of autonomous vehicles than the technical challenges of making the systems reliable and cheap enough for mass-market vehicles.
"These systems are going to consist of collections of interactive, semi-autonomous programs...something like software agents that collaborate with each other, " says Kephart.
The company deployed the sonar on its torpedo-like Bluefin-21 autonomous underwater vehicle and then used a video-equipped remotely operated vehicle owned by Submersible Systems Inc. to inspect any promising radar targets.
As adaptive cruise controls, self-parking options and automated-braking systems gradually become more capable and widespread, it is not a big leap to full autonomous control.
Autonomous driving in slow traffic is a logical combination of adaptive cruise-control and the lane-keeping systems, already available in some vehicles, which either warn the driver if the car starts to drift out of lane, or apply corrective steering to keep it in lane.
Dr. Eskandarian said that Japan, where navigation systems are hugely popular and automation is a big thing, is making the greatest forward progress in adopting autonomous driving.
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