Sardines solve traffic chaos!

Nissan's new "EPORO* robot car concept, which is designed to travel in a group of like-vehicles, mimicking the behavioral patterns of a school of fish in avoiding obstacles without colliding with each other.

Fish Behavior Rules


AREA 1: Collision Avoidance

Change traveling direction without colliding with other fish.

AREA 2: Traveling Side-by-Side

Travel side-by-side with other fish while keeping a certain distance between each fish (to match the speed).

AREA 3: Approaching

Gain closer proximity to other fish that are at a distance from them.

Generically, fish recognize the surroundings based on lateral-line sense and sense of sight and form schools based on three behavior rules. A laser range finder*4 is used for lateral-line sense, while UWB*5 communications technology is utilized for the sense of sight.

"We, in a motorized world, have a lot to learn from the behavior of a school of fish in terms of each fish's degree of freedom and safety within a school and high migration efficiency of a school itself. In EPORO, we recreated the behavior of a school of fish making full use of cutting-edge electronic technologies," said Toshiyuki Andou, Manager of Nissan's Mobility Laboratory and principal engineer of the robot car project. "By sharing the surrounding information received within the group via communication, the group of EPOROs can travel safely, changing its shape as needed." This is the world's first development of a robot car that can travel in a group by sharing the position and information of others within a group via communication technologies.