The Role of the Hercules Autonomous Vehicle During the COVID-19 Pandemic: An Autonomous Logistic Vehicle for Contactless Goods Transportation

Tianyu Liu, Qinghai Liao, Lu Gan, Fulong Ma, Jie Cheng, Xupeng Xie, Zhe Wang, Yingbing Chen, Yilong Zhu, Shuyang Zhang, Zhengyong Chen, Yang Liu, Meng Xie, Yang Yu, Zitong Guo, Guang Li, Peidong Yuan, Dong Han, Yuying Chen, Haoyang Ye et al. (11 additional authors not shown)

Abstract: Since early 2020, COVID-19 has spread rapidly across the world. At the date of this writing, the disease has been globally reported in 220 countries and regions, infected more than 68 million people, and caused more than 1.5 million deaths (see https://covid19.who.int/) for up-to-date statistics. Avoiding person-to-person transmission is an effective approach to control and prevent the pandemic. However, many daily activities, such as transporting goods in our daily life, inevitably involve person-to-person contact.