In the future mobility technologies offered by Nissan, we would see a great touch of the animal kingdom because the engineers of the Japanese brand get inspired from the members of the animal kingdom and so they shape the future mobility in accordance with them. The engineers and the R&D are trying to achieve zero fatalities and injuries for the occupants of their vehicles. The research team of the Nissan developed the EPORO (EPisode O Robot), that features a Laser Range Finder (LRF) technology, an inspiration from the bumblebee’s compound eyes that are able to see more than 300 degrees. The EPORO units can communicate with each other to avoid collisions and are also able to move side-by-side/single file just like the swimming of fishes. The LRF technology will also detect obstacles in its way within the range of 180 degrees up to two meters.

The Nissan’s engineering director of advanced technology and research, Toru Futami said the study of animal behavior moving in a group helps the engineers to explore effective ways for the interaction of the vehicles in a safe, environmentally friendly way delivering efficient driving dynamics.

Futami also shared “In current traffic laws, cars are supposed to drive within the lanes and come to a halt at stop signals, but if all cars were autonomous, the need for lanes and even signals could be gone. We talked about fishes earlier, and fish follow these three rules: Don’t go away too far, don’t get too close and don’t hit each other. Fish form schools with these three rules. A school of fish doesn’t have lines to help guide the fishes, but they manage to swim extremely close to each other. So if cars can perform the same type of thing within a group and move accordingly, we should be able to have more cars operate with the same width roads. This would lead to more cars, but with less traffic congestion.”