Mapping

Google is adding a new mode to its Maps platform that enables users to enjoy sweeping views of cities and neighborhoods in impressive detail, even allowing interior views of restaurants to help you get a "feel for the vibe."

While AUVs (autonomous underwater vehicles) are invaluable for gathering oceanographic data, they also tend to be fairly large and very expensive. The Hydrus offers a much smaller, less costly alternative, which still packs a lot of punch.

Lately we're seeing how sophisticated, ocean-going robots might help us map the seafloor, and one particularly interesting example has just successfully proved its mapping capabilities during its maiden voyage between San Francisco and Hawaii.

San Francisco-based aquatic drone-maker Saildrone has returned with a bigger and better version of its unmanned vehicle designed to explore the seas, the newly introduced 72-ft (22-m) Saildrone Surveyor.

When NASA's Perseverance Mars rover touches down on the Red Planet on February 18, 2021, its descent stage will guide it autonomously to a (hopefully) safe landing thanks to a pair of the most precise Martian maps ever produced.

In order for AR systems to recognize locations from a user's ground-level perspective, they first have to be "trained" using ground-level images of those same places. Sturfee's City AR system, however, works quicker by utilizing satellite photos.

The Shell Ocean Discovery XPrize drew plenty of interesting ideas in its bid to inspire new solutions for mapping the world's oceans, but it was team GEBCO-NF that triumphed, with its vehicle designed to autonomously survey the seafloor over long periods of time.​​​

It has been years since Google’s influential Street View left the roads and began to map everything from shopping centers to hiking trails. The device that made this happen was called the Street View Trekker, and Google just revealed an updated model.

The potential of drones flying through the sky is well documented, but they also hold great potential for environments deep beneath the Earth's surface. Australian-based startup Emesant is developing drone software focused on the autonomous mapping of mines and tunnels.

​Ordinarily, fixed-wing mapping drones either just perform a traditional landing on the ground, or they parachute down to it. However, what if they're being used over the water? Well, that's where Aeromao's new Aeromapper Talon Amphibious drone comes in.

​You might think that with all their cameras and other sensors, self-driving cars can handle any road in any location. That actually isn't the case, although it soon may be, thanks to MIT's new MapLite system.

​When it comes to making city maps based on aerial photos, manually tracing all the roads can be quite the hassle. As a result, we're now seeing computer programs that do so automatically. Scientists at MIT have developed a program of their own, that is promised to be even better at the job.