Add to this an ultra-lightweight solar cell and navigation system (about which Draper is not revealing much), and you've got a complete dragonfly takeover unit that weighs a fraction of a gram.
Now being tested on a Town and Country minivan, it enables the driver to control the inflow of information from cell phones, navigation systems and warning messages.
It has built a $10 million simulator -- involving projectors, digital sound synthesizers and a Ford Taurus attached to a hydraulic-motion platform -- to measure drivers' ability to handle traffic situations while using cell phones, navigation systems and other equipment.
Voice prompts and the car's replies will give drivers hands-free access to cell phones, navigation systems and the Internet.
It boasts a xenon-fueled ion propulsion system, high-efficiency solar cells, and an automated navigation system, AutoNav, that enables it to find its way in interplanetary space by tracking stars and asteroids, without help from ground controllers.
For example, all of the antennas for a global positioning system, if you have a navigation system; FM/AM; cell phone; and for the key-fob-activated lock-unlock controls are hidden in the plastic boot lid.
Stand-alone options like a navigation system, solar-cell roof ventilation, pre-collision automatic braking, radar cruise control, lane-minders and automated parallel parking are all in the works.
The navigation system and the cell phone proved useful from the start.
He will measure the distractions caused by a variety of devices and situations, including a driver alone with a cell phone, a radio and a navigation system, and a passenger using those devices while the driver tries to pay attention to the road.
Sailing the Seas The Wireless Way The modern world: two people in a 26-foot-long rowboat that they built by hand, somewhere in the Atlantic, with laptop computer, cell phone, digital camera, modem and a Global Positioning System navigation system.
