UCLA researchers create wireless network to connect drivers

Many Americans today are choosing to unplug, whether by using cell phones or signing onto the Internet via personal laptops in the middle of Starbucks, and UCLA researchers say cars may be next.

Drivers can receive data such as travel information and traffic updates via the Internet from their cars using the connection created by a car-to-car network.

Mario Gerla, a computer science professor at the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, created a wireless network to exist between cars, allowing for the transfer of information between cars at the press of a button while on the road.

“Cars can do more than drive us around,” Gerla said. “We can use the vehicles to download information from the Internet that is useful to us when driving around.”

The project is based on the principles of a wireless, mobile ad-hoc networking platform, or MANET, that allows moving vehicles within a range of 100 to 300 meters of each other to connect and, car by car, create a network with a wide range, according to a press release.

Cars that fall out of range drop out of the network, and other equipped cars can also join the network to receive or send signals.

A car equipped with such wireless capability can access information from both the Internet and from surrounding cars. Existing wireless connections to the Internet require a stationary access point, such as a cell phone tower, but Gerla’s network bypasses this setup.

For example, individuals can gain travel and tourist information such as maps and must-see sights from the comfort of their cars, Gerla said.

Car-to-car information can also communicate the specific location of the cars and suggest potential detailed travel plans. Drivers can be alerted of safety issues, including car accidents that have occurred or dangers on the road such as blind curves, Gerla said.

Researchers said the project is fueled by their desire to create new technology.

“Why are we interested? Because it is a challenge,” said Giovanni Pau, assistant director of the project, explaining that wireless networks have never been created in cars.

The project has also garnered attention because wireless communication may one day be a standard in all cars.

“We think in the future that vehicle-to-vehicle will become an important way of exchanging information,” Gerla said.

“There are other methods, like cell phone or satellite, but (those methods) are not free.”

Over the past several months, undergraduate and graduate students have helped Gerla with his research, usually driving and riding in the cars during experiments, he said.

The project receives the majority of its funding from private grants, Pau said.

But privacy concerns are one of the main problems the project has faced.

Some of the applications used to create the wireless connection always remain on, which could allow for drivers to track other drivers or find out personal information, Gerla said.

He added that a lot of work has been focused on maintaining driver privacy, including applications that would allow for the anonymous transfer of information so that the identities of drivers would remain hidden.

The project is not finished yet, but Gerla and his team hope that car-to-car wireless connections will be used in public vehicles such as ambulances and buses and become a manufacturer-installed standard for personal automobiles.

Gerla approximated that in five years consumers will see car-to-car communication in the market.

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