Singapore already is home to a fleet of self-driving cars that can be hailed with a smartphone. Soon, residents and visitors to the city may be able to choose a driverless bus as one of their available transportation options for moving around the Asian city. And we are not talking small buses here; Singapore is going big and rolling out two 40-foot-long driverless buses that are controlled robotically.
The driverless bus trial is the result of a partnership between Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and CleanTech Park, an eco-business park that encourages the development of clean technology. The pair has already worked together on driverless cars, developing and operating a self-driving shuttle between the university’s campus and the CleanTech business park. The shuttle has been in operation since 2013.
NTU will use its knowledge and experience from the shuttle trial as it develops its driverless bus system. The researchers plan to equip two electric hybrid buses with the sensors and software system to pilot the bus through the crowded city streets. “So, this autonomous bus trial is the first of its kind in Singapore that will aim to improve road safety, reduce vehicle congestion, alleviate pollution and address manpower challenges,” said NTU Chief of Staff and Vice-President of Research Lam Khin Yong to Channel News Asia.
Similar to the shuttle, the buses initially will transport passengers between NTU and CleanTech Park with plans to extend the transportation network to include the outlying Pioneer MRT Station in the future. Unlike the smaller shuttles which provide taxi-level service, the larger single deck buses are capable of carrying up to 80 passengers, providing city dwellers with a mass transit option.
The pilot program will be administered by Singapore’s Land Transport Authority (LTA) along with NTU. Results of the pilot will be analyzed by the LTA along with Google, which is known for its work on driverless car technology. Using feedback from the trial, the LTE hopes to extend the driverless bus system beyond its initial college campus route and bring it to additional transit stations in the city.
Soon, a mattress protector may be more than a bed cover. Australian medtech company Sleeptite and researchers at RMIT University have received a US patent for FlexiSense, a smart bedding technology that tracks body position and posture to help caregivers identify when older residents may be at risk of falling.
The technology is being developed for Sleeptite’s in-bed monitoring system, REMi, and was recently on display at The MedTech Conference in Boston. A peer-reviewed study in Flexible and Printed Electronics says the sensors can also be made at scale without sacrificing performance or durability.
AI companies spend enormous amounts of time convincing us their technology is safe and secure. But what happens when those same companies become targets of increasingly sophisticated AI-powered attacks? Anthropic, the company behind Claude, is now facing that question. According to a Washington Post report, cybersecurity startup Cathedral discovered vulnerabilities that let its researchers access sensitive information in Anthropic's internal systems.
The researchers used AI agents to identify potential entry points in less than 12 hours. Interestingly, they didn't need to crack Claude itself. Instead, they exploited weaknesses in third-party business applications that Anthropic uses for everyday operations. Anthropic's security testing program disclosed the findings, which allows outside researchers to identify and report vulnerabilities.
Military working dogs charge into places the rest of us would flee. So, I understand why anyone would want to breed tougher, healthier dogs for the job.
Warhound, a new startup from Colossal Biosciences co-founder Ben Lamm and Anduril co-founder Palmer Luckey, has stepped out of stealth with $200 million to clone and gene-edit working dogs for American troops, police departments, and emergency services (via TechCrunch).