While current research and development of autonomous driving primarily focuses on developing new features and algorithms, the transfer from isolated software components into an entire software stack has been covered sparsely. Besides that, due to the complexity of autonomous software stacks and public road traffic, the optimal validation of entire stacks is an open research problem. Our paper focuses on these two aspects. We present our autonomous research vehicle EDGAR and its digital twin, a detailed virtual duplication of the vehicle. While the vehicle's setup is closely related to the state of the art, its virtual duplication is a valuable contribution as it is crucial for a consistent validation process from simulation to real-world tests. In addition, different development teams can work with the same model, making integration and testing of software stacks much easier, significantly accelerating the development process. The real and virtual vehicles are embedded in a comprehensive development environment, which is also introduced. All parameters of the digital twin are provided open-source at https://github.com/TUMFTM/edgar

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your Automaton bloggers. We'll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months; here's what we have so far (send us your events!): Let us know if you have suggestions for next week, and enjoy today's videos. Not everyone managed to get their holiday videos posted in time for us to steal them for the last Video Friday of 2018, so let's just pretend the holidays are still going on, you've eaten too much, your family is driving you nuts, and you can't wait for things to just get back to normal. And if you need 300 days of recovery because of the music, better just hit mute right now.

What is it like to compete in a car race that isn't about speed, but rather fuel efficiency? As more than 100 people found out on March 3 at the Sonoma Raceway: really fun. A broad cross-section of the Silicon Valley community participated in Toyota Onramp 2017, an annual event hosted by Toyota Research Institute (TRI). The cornerstone of the event was the Prius Challenge, where the teams competed to see how efficiently they could drive nine laps at Sonoma Raceway. The competition also featured a special guest, Toyota Chairman of the Board Takeshi Uchiyamada.

Daimler, the maker of Mercedes-Benz and Smart cars, has announced that it will start selling a self-driving car by 2020. It is thought the car will be able to drive on its own in most situations but will still hand control back to the driver during difficult situations such as dealing with traffic lights. The move could help Daimler regain its position as the leading luxury car market from its rival BMW. 'We want to be the first to launch autonomous functions in production vehicles. You can be sure: we will accomplish that in this decade,' said Daimler head of development Thomas Weber.

No, it's Ford's latest self-driving development car, which the company unveiled Wednesday ahead of what's expected to be a crush of autonomous competitors at the CES trade show next week in Las Vegas. That luggage rack and antlers hold state-of-the-art camera and sensor technology that Ford hopes will keep it ahead of the increasingly crowded pack. For instance, compared to the company's prior autonomous research vehicle (going on three years old), the new model has a much faster computer and more powerful LiDAR sensors. The dual LiDAR extend from the sides of the car, mounted on antlerlike arms attached on the A-pillars, above the sideview mirrors. Where the prior research vehicle needed four such sensors, the latest generation needs only two.

In the next five years, experts say that autonomous vehicles will be entrenched in smart cities' infrastructure to include mass transit, traffic lights, other vehicles, gas stations, homes and just about anything that requires connectivity. "Connected and autonomous vehicles will play a significant role in the Smart Cities of the future. These cities will need ways to ease congestion, enable more efficient transportation, and reduce pollution," said Scott Frank, Airbiquity vice president of marketing. "Connected and autonomous vehicles will serve this purpose by enabling new transportation and ownership models that take vehicles off the street and curb, like ride sharing, and their environmental benefit will be further strengthened with continued penetration of hybrid and electric drivetrains." Mass transit in smart cities will help spur autonomous vehicle's growth, but it will all be about cost savings, said Bob Bilbruck, CEO of B2 Group.

The unmistakable glare of car headlights cutting through the darkness on roads at night could soon vanish thanks to new self-driving technology. Car giant Ford has revealed it is testing the ability of its autonomous vehicles to navigate in pitch black conditions without any headlights. The cars use laser sensing technology, called LiDAR, to map the vehicles' surroundings with infrared light, allowing them to steer along even the most winding country roads. Ford has tested its self-driving cars on winding country roads in pitch darkness to show that the vehicles can navigate at night without any headlights. Ford said it is essential its self-driving vehicles are able to stay on the road at times of the day when they are not able to use its camera technology as there is not enough light.