A new era began in Victorville, California, as 11 driverless vehicles pulled out of the starting gates early in the morning at the DARPA Urban Challenge. By early afternoon, six of them had completed the course successfully -- after 60 miles of interacting with other manned and unmanned vehicles.

Powered by sophisticated software designed to process millions of data points delivered by laser scanners and other optical sensors, the vehicles were required to navigate perfectly through traffic while obeying all signs and speed limits. The closed course, on streets of a deserted residential neighborhood at the former George Air Force Base, was populated by human-driven cars as well as the other autonomous ones.

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