Yahama’s Robo-motorcyclist Tears Around a Racetrack at 124 MPH
And it’s totally mesmerizing to watch in action. The video above shows the company’s Motobot—literally, a robotic motorcyclist that sits atop a standard Yamaha and controls and balances the bike—as it charges around a racetrack and tries to beat a time set by world champion Valentino Rossi.
As IEEE Spectrum notes, Motobot doesn’t deal with new environments the way an Uber or Waymo autonomous car can. But it uses GPS and inertial measurements to place itself on a high-res map of a track to within an inch, and then uses that information to control the bike so that it can follow a course. And it does so at speeds of up to 124 miles per hour in a straight line.
Sadly, it can’t keep up with Rossi, though: it took 117.50 seconds to perform a lap, compared with the pro’s 85.74 seconds. Maybe next time, Motobot.
Keep Reading
Most Popular
The inside story of how ChatGPT was built from the people who made it
Exclusive conversations that take us behind the scenes of a cultural phenomenon.
How Rust went from a side project to the world’s most-loved programming language
For decades, coders wrote critical systems in C and C++. Now they turn to Rust.
ChatGPT is about to revolutionize the economy. We need to decide what that looks like.
New large language models will transform many jobs. Whether they will lead to widespread prosperity or not is up to us.
Design thinking was supposed to fix the world. Where did it go wrong?
An approach that promised to democratize design may have done the opposite.
Stay connected
Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review
Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.