(Newser)
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A robot car built by Carnegie Mellon University and General Motors beat out ten others to win a race for self-driving vehicles, race officials announced today. The cars had 6 hours to complete a 60-mile course—including missions like parking and merging into traffic—in pursuit of a $2 million grand prize. Second-place finisher Standford University won $1 million and third-place Virginia Tech took home $500,000.
Cars in the DARPA Urban Challenge use software to process information gleaned from sensors and GPS units to navigate without any human input. The race is run by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency as part of a plan to develop autonomously controlled ground combat vehicles. This is the first year it's taken place in an urban setting, rather than off-road desert courses.
