Robot meets robot in 'Darpa city' race

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or Darpa, raised the green flag on Saturday on 11 driverless cars to manoeuvre through a 60-mile course at the former George Air Force Base in Oro Grande, California — or what race officials dubbed Darpa city. It was part of Darpa's $3.5m (£1.6m) robot race, the Urban Grand Challenge.

Stanford university's robot, Junior, was the first to cross the finishing line in the Urban Grand Challenge, a six-hour test of autonomous vehicles with three separate missions. But the robot ultimately lost to Carnegie Mellon University's driverless car, Boss, which was faster overall.

Carnegie Mellon's team, Tartan Racing, won the $2m (£1m) first prize. Stanford took second place and snagged $1m (£500,000).