The top U.S. auto safety regulator said on Thursday the agency is seeking additional details of a recent crash of an Alphabet Google self-driving car in California. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) chief Mark Rosekind told Reuters on the sidelines of an event on highway safety that the agency is collecting more information to get a'more detailed exploration of what exactly happened.' A Google self-driving car struck a municipal bus in Mountain View in a minor crash on Feb. 14, and the search engine firm said it bears'some responsibility' for the incident in what may be the first crash that was the fault of the self-driving vehicle. Footage recorded by cameras on the bus shows the Lexus SUV, which Google has outfitted with sensors and cameras that let it drive itself, edging into the path of the bus that was rolling by at about 15 mph. Here, it can be seen on the right of the image, next to the kerb. Neither the Google employee in the driver's seat -- who must be there under California law to take the wheel in an emergency -- nor the 16 people on the bus were injured.

The head of Alphabet's Google self-driving car programme will urge the U.S. Congress on Tuesday to grant national auto safety regulators new authority to speed the introduction of self-driving cars on American roads. Chris Urmson, director of Google's self-driving cars programme, will tell the Senate Commerce Committee that legislators should grant new authority to the U.S. Transportation Department to help get fully autonomous vehicles on the road, according to his prepared testimony, which was reviewed by Reuters. 'We propose that Congress move swiftly to provide the secretary of transportation with new authority to approve life saving safety innovations. The head of Alphabet's Google self-driving car programme will urge the U.S. Congress on Tuesday to grant new authority to speed the introduction of self-driving cars on American roads. In January, the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said it may waive some vehicle safety rules to allow more driverless cars to operate on U.S. roads as part of a broader effort to speed up development of self-driving vehicles. NHTSA said Friday in a report there are significant legal hurdles to allowing fully autonomous vehicles without steering wheels.

It may have been developed with lftier goals, but Atlas, a terrifying 6 foot 2 robot developed by Google's Boston Dynamics spinoff, hasbeen taught to help around the house. The robot, which competed in the US Military's'Robot Olympics' can now hoover, sweep and even throw a paper plane into the trash. Researchers in Florida revealed the upgrade in a video. The 6 foot robot, which competed in the US Military's'Robot Olympics' can now hoover, sweep and even throw a paper plane into the trash. According to Boston Dynamics, Atlas is a'high mobility, humanoid robot designed to negotiate outdoor, rough terrain.

Protracted negotiations within the United Nations are causing'killer robots' to move a step closer to reality, an expert has warned. The UK and US are currently attempting to water down a preemptive ban on autonomous weapons at the UN general assembly in New York. But this is delaying an agreement on banning the technology, which could allow nations to possess killer robots before any laws come into force. Protracted negotiations within the United Nations are causing'killer robots' to move a step closer to reality, an expert has warned. This was the stark warning made by Christof Heyns, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, in an in-depth article for The Guardian.

Artificial intelligence could be a reality within years, rather than decades, scientists have said. Elon Musk recently warned AI has the potential to be as dangerous to mankind as nuclear weapons. But is there hope for artificial intelligence in the form of religion? And could faith allow AI to do more good than harm? Elon Musk recently warned AI has the potential to be as dangerous to mankind as nuclear weapons.

In the year since the European Court of Justice ruled that anyone can ask Google to remove personal information about them, the site has evaluated more than one million links. Each request has to be verified and processed by a dedicated team of people, but the sheer volume can cause delays. To speed this up, researchers from Germany and New Zealand have developed an algorithm capable of analysing hundreds of such requests in seconds. Oblivion (illustrated) allows a user to automatically find and tag their personal information on the web, using both text - or natural language processing (NLP) - and image recognition. And they hope to offer it to Google, and other search engines, to help them manage future demands.

A humanoid robot named Yangyang is the latest to be revealed in China. Dressed in a full-length coat, the android can display a wide range of facial expressions and can speak, move its head, and raise its hands to greet people convincingly. And the machine bears an uncanny - yet apparently accidental - resemblance to former Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. Yangyang is one of a number of impressively realistic robots to be unveiled at the Global Mobile Internet Conference (GMIC) 2015 in Beijing, China. The android was produced jointly by China's Shanghai Yangyang Intelligent Robot Science Service Centre and renowned Japanese robotics professor Hiroshi Ishiguro, who has created some of the world's most eerily lifelike androids.

The US Army is developing sympathetic avatars to communicate meaningfully and sympathetically with humans. Research is well underway that aims to help humans and robots speak the same language and boost communication in the unpredictable and upsetting situations that war brings. Scientists are honing interactive virtual humans that serve as mentors and role players to soldiers, to teach them leadership skills and act as counsellors. The US Army is developing virtual humans to train and help its soldiers. This image shows virtual Staff Sgt.

Nasa's next rover to land on Mars could have a little helper to help keep it safe while exploring the planet's surface. British engineers have been testing a new type of intelligent robot that can be deployed from a larger vehicle on the Martian surface to act as a scout in the surrounding landscape. They hope the scout, which is about 30 inches (76cm) long, will be used on a planned joint Nasa and European Space Agency mission to bring back samples of soil from Mars to Earth. British engineers are testing a new intelligent scout robot (shown). They say it could be deployed from a larger vehicle on the Martian surface.

For fans of the cult film the Karate Kid, it is a familiar pose. However, in the latest video from the US military team developing a two legged fighting robot, the buildup to'crane kick' is seen in a new way. The researchers taught the robot to stand on one leg - recreating a key scene from the film in the process. According to Boston Dynamics, Atlas is a'high mobility, humanoid robot designed to negotiate outdoor, rough terrain. 'Atlas can walk bipedally leaving the upper limbs free to lift, carry, and manipulate the environment.