Google's gumdrop-shaped autonomous car looks like something you'd see in a Pixar movie, a cute and cuddly machine that makes the future look fun--until it ambushes you in a crosswalk, traps you like a fly in a web, and whisks you away. That horrific scenario comes to mind reading Google's recently approved patent for what amounts to slathering its cars in glue. To be fair, this has less to do with collecting humans than protecting them. Autonomous vehicles absolutely will reduce collisions and fatalities, but even the most ardent advocates concede one of them eventually will hit a pedestrian. Google engineers believe coating the front of a car with adhesive could prevent someone from bouncing onto the windshield, sliding under the wheels, or flying into the air and landing in the road.

Google has come up with a way to keep pedestrians who are hit by self-driving cars off the road... and stuck to the hood. The company has received a new patent for a protective coating on the car's hood, front bumper and front side panels that would act as flypaper, taking the pedestrian from struck to stuck. Google explains that when pedestrians are struck by cars, injury comes not only from the initial impact with the vehicle - but from the'secondary impact' when they hit the road or another car. The adhesive coating Google has proposed would be covered by another'protective coating' that would shatter from the impact of a collision, including one involving a person or animal. Google has received a new patent for an adhesive coating that would keep pedestrians stuck to the hood like flypaper in the situation they're hit by a self-moving car That would then expose the adhesive coating, which would bond the pedestrian to the vehicle and keep them from'bouncing off' into the street and incoming traffic.

Google prides itself on the safety record of its groundbreaking self-driving cars but as an extra precaution the company is working on a "sticky" hood that will prevent pedestrians from bouncing off the cars if hit. Having driven over 1.5 million miles since beginning testing in 2014, Google's self-driving cars reported their first accident only last month when the search giant admitted it was at least partly responsible for an accident, which saw one of its fleet of Lexus SUVs collide with a public bus. Previously, all crashes reported involving one of Google's fleet had been blamed on driver error. Google is keen to continue leading the way in the area of autonomous cars amid competition from traditional carmakers as well as companies like Faraday Future, Tesla and reportedly Apple. To that end, Google wants to help protect those pedestrians who may wander in front of one of its cars -- by making them "stick" to the hood.

Google has patented a new "sticky" technology to protect pedestrians if – or when – they get struck by the company's self-driving cars. The patent, which was granted on 17 May, is for a sticky adhesive layer on the front end of a vehicle, which would aim to reduce the damage caused when a pedestrian hit by a car is flung into other vehicles or scenery. Related: Google's self-driving car: How does it work and when can we drive one? "Ideally, the adhesive coating on the front portion of the vehicle may be activated on contact and will be able to adhere to the pedestrian nearly instantaneously," according to the patent description. "This instantaneous or nearly-instantaneous action may help to constrain the movement of the pedestrian, who may be carried on the front end of the vehicle until the driver of the vehicle (or the vehicle itself in the case of an autonomous vehicle) reacts to the incident and applies the brakes."