LIDAR
Ranging sensor that measures distance by timing laser pulses, producing dense 3D point clouds used in mapping, robotics, and autonomous vehicles.
LIDAR (LiDAR, light detection and ranging) is a sensor that estimates distance by firing laser pulses and measuring how long reflected light takes to return. A scanning unit sweeps those measurements across an angle to build a point cloud, a three-dimensional map of surfaces in the surrounding scene. Unlike cameras alone, LIDAR provides direct range estimates that are largely independent of lighting conditions, which makes it valuable for autonomous driving and mobile robotics.
Competing teams in the DARPA Grand Challenge relied heavily on LIDAR together with cameras and onboard mapping to stay on desert routes without human steering. Stanford’s winning vehicle Stanley in 2005 used multiple laser rangefinders to detect terrain and obstacles at speed. LIDAR remains a common component in self-driving research and commercial stacks, sometimes complemented by radar and vision-based machine learning. See the DARPA Grand Challenge article and timeline entry.