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Training Self-Driving Cars

 

what's up superstars, time to shine bright and get our minds right.

 

I'm Coy, this is CNN 10 and it is your CNN 10 especially on a Your Word Wednesday because one of you helped us write today's show with one of your unique vocabulary word submissions.

 

Let's start today with the latest hurdle of driverless car companies looking to become mainstream.

 

Driverless cars also known as self-driving or autonomous vehicles navigate without human input.

 

Instead they use sensors,cameras,radar and LIDAR which stands for Light Detection And Ranging to detect road signals,other vehicles and the terrain around them.

 

The car's software powered by artificial intelligence machine learning algorithms uses the data collected to send almost instantaneous instructions to the car's controls.

 

instantaneous [͵ɪnstənˋtenɪəs] adj. 瞬间的，实时的

 

Testing and launching autonomous cars has been an anfractuous journey.

 

anfractuous [ænˋfræktʃʊəs] adj. 多弯曲的

 

There have been crashes from systems malfunctions.

 

There have been pedestrian accidents when systems didn't respond to people.

 

In one case earlier this year a Los Angeles tech entrepreneur found himself trapped in a self-driving taxi on his way to the airport with the car repeatedly circling around a parking lot.

 

What in the world would you do.

 

After years of research and testing though autonomous cars are already on the streets of cities from San Francisco to Wuhan.

 

And now high-speed unmarked roads in rural areas which sometimes have very few signs have become the next challenge in testing driverless cars.

 

Check out how car manufacturer Nissan set out to navigate this hurdle in the UK to develop an autonomous car that can handle every type of road it might encounter.

 

Wow it's incredible a driverless car can drive like this.

 

Autonomous cars -- you can already find them on the streets of San Francisco and Wuhan.

 

But there's one place they have yet to conquer.The winding,high-speed country roads of the UK.

 

We think this is one of the most ambitious autonomous driving programs that's ongoing today in the world.

 

We feel if we hadn't have done the research in the UK we would not have had something which would be so comprehensive to cover all of the roads the future customer needs.

 

comprehensive [͵kɑmprɪˋhɛnsɪv] adj. 广泛的; 无所不包的；综合的

 

The difficult thing about autonomous driving or AD is there are lots of things that can go wrong in cities.

 

There are lots of aids to help AD cars road markings,slow speeds signs,traffic lights but those aids are less common on the roads outside cities.

 

And that's where the Nissan-led evolvAD program comes in.

 

What we have here is our next generation autonomous vehicles.

 

These vehicles have the capability of driving down rural roads following the highway code but doing speeds of 55 to 60 mph.

 

How do you start it?

 

This is where I get the signal.ADis ready when you are.

 

So you happy to set off Yep.

 

And the vehicle's now in autonomous mode.

 

It's quite ghostly isn't it? When it kind of does the whole thing by itself,cuz we do this all day every day.

 

ghostly [ˋgostlɪ] adj. 鬼似的；可怕的

 

It's uh we forget what it must feel,like for new people to jump in and experience it for the first time.

 

evolvAD is the last step in the research phase of Nissan's autonomous driving journey having successfully proven the technology on highways and in cities.

 

There's likely one question though on many people's minds,Is it safe?

 

It acts better than advanced driver because an advanced driver looks to the left and to the right.

 

The AD vehicle looks all around it all the time.

 

This makes it much safer.

 

Feels really different being out front like this Yeah the car is covered with sensors including laser technology and cameras.

 

And Nissan has also introduced a chassis control system that enhances braking and steering.

 

chassis [ˋʃæsɪ] n. 车身底盘

 

There are other sources of information the car can use as well.

 

We can take signals from outside of the vehicle such as CCT cameras this kind of thing which basically gives us an added capability which means that we can see effectively around the corner.

 

After 16,000 miles on the UK's public roads and no accidents.

 

Nissan's plan is to take the learnings from the evolvAD program and use them in the development of their first autonomous vehicle mobility service due to hit the roads of Japan in 2027.

 

This is great technology and it's something you're going to see a lot more of in the future.

 

Pop quiz hot shot

 

What is a collective noun for a group of gorillas

 

Troop

Cluster

School

Crash.

 

Troop There it is agroup of gorillas is called a troop.

 

They stay in family groups that can have up to 30 members including a dominant male several females and their youngins.

 

youngin: a young one: a youth, a child, a kid, young person

 

Mountain gorillas have been classified as endangered,meaning they face a very high risk of extinction in the wild because of factors like poaching,habitat loss and disease.

 

gorilla [gəˋrɪlə] n. 大猩猩

 

Well Uganda's first wildlife vet and conservation NGO founder has started a project empowering locals to grow cash crops like coffee or tea to support safe and healthy gorilla populations.

 

Our Bill Weir shows us how the Ready to Grow program is helping people gorillas and other wildlife coexist.

 

In the highlands of southwestern Uganda Dr Glattis Kalema Zukosoka is working to break the chain of disease transmission between humans and mountain gorillas.

 

But sickness is just one of the many challenges facing these great apes.

 

With such close proximity to the Bwindi impenetrable national park much of the local community has relied on the forest for food and firewood for generations.

 

impenetrable [ɪmˋpɛnətrəb!] adj. 不能通过的；不能穿过的

firewood [ˋfaɪr͵wʊd] n. 木柴；柴火

 

And though the intention is rarely to hurt the gorillas they are vulnerable to accidental injury.

 

In most cases these people are just looking to put food on the table.

 

Um the subsistence poachers,they're hungry.

 

subsistence [səbˋsɪstəns] n. 维持生计; 靠…活下去

 

That's the main reason they're poaching.

 

So they don't actually attack the gorillas to eat them.

 

If they're busy poaching other animals like duiker, bushpig and they come across gorillas that happens from time to time.they set out snares and they spear the gorillas because they're trying to go for other food.

 

duiker [ˋdaɪkɚ] n. 小羚羊

snare [snɛr] n.（捕捉鸟、兽等的）陷阱，罗网；圈套

 

The mission to reduce poaching in the forest is twofold.

 

First help the local community see the benefits that gorilla tourism can bring to the area in the form of new jobs and infrastructure and schools.

 

And secondly in helping former poachers find alternative income.

 

During the pandemic we started the ready to grow program where we give them fast growing seedlings.

 

seedling [ˋsidlɪŋ] n. 籽生植物；幼苗；秧苗；苗木

 

So far now we've distributed to 3,000 households.

 

And then we also try encourage them to have a cash crop like coffee or tea because the more that they have food security the less likely they're going to enter the forest to poach.

 

So in 2016 Gladysand her husband Lawrence launched a new coffee brand that would provide a stable income for Bwindi's farmers while also protecting the gorillas.

 

We started off with 75 farmers of which only five were women.

 

We now have 630 farmers of which 230 are women and it's going really well.

 

It's set up to only sell coffee from where gorillas are found.

 

And this equates to premium of specialty coffee.

 

And a donation from every bag sold goes to support community health,gorilla health and conservation education in the same communities around the national park.

 

So we're in that way we're providing sustainable financing for conservation.

 

Today's story is getting a 10 out of 10 So 20 out of 20 Man versus nature and nature versus nature.

 

A lightning strike from above wreaking havoc on a poor old tree you just have to see all caught on a home security camera in Tennessee.

 

And in Utah we get to see what happened when engineers tested out avalanche prevention by setting off another avalanche.

 

Our Jeremy Roth has more

 

This one in Utah where the official response to a natural avalanche was to set off another unnatural one.

 

Engineers did just that triggering an intense snowy slide that kicked up a powdery plume in the Cottonwoods Canyon area.

 

All to try and prevent damage should just such a thing happen again Uh just trust me it all makes sense.

 

Finally nobody planned for it.

 

Nobody could control it.

 

But it appears no one was injured when a lightning bolt suddenly blasted a Nashville home's front yard tree.

So now we all get to marvel at it.

 

The sudden strike sent splinters and shards flying in the surveillance video which is impressive but unfortunately has no sound.

 

splinter [ˋsplɪntɚ] n. 裂片，碎片

shard [ʃɑrd] n.（瓷器、金属等的)碎片

 

So please allow me Thank you Thank you very much.

 

Huge thanks to everyone who submitted an array of considerable commanding and demanding words for your word Wednesday.

 

Today's winner is Sharon High School in Sharon Massachusetts for and anfractuous an adjective meaning full of twists and turns.

 

Sharon is caring about our vocab Well done.

 

And we've got a special shout out today going to Llata High School in Laplata, Maryland Rise up Warriors Maryland has their men's and women's hoops teams in the Sweet 16 for the first time in school history Oh yes.

 

hoop [hup] n. basketball

 

Thank you to everyone who's been subscribing and commenting on our CNN 10 YouTube channel for your shoutout requests Keep them coming Wish we could get to you all I'll get to y'all tomorrow right back here on

 

CNN 10.