News

Research Sees GPS Here, There and Everywhere

Many inventions soon find uses far beyond what their inventors intended. The Global Positioning System is a great example. Created by the US Department of Defense for military navigation, GPS is now as prevalent as the common cold, according to ABI Research.

It is the middle of the night on a farm in the American Midwest, and a tractor is spraying pesticides, guided by GPS. GPS guidance of farm and construction machinery has been growing since the late 1990s, and allows farmers to work more efficiently around the clock.

In California, high-risk parolees are being tracked by permanently-attached GPS ankle bands. Their accuracy allows law-enforcement agencies to be alerted if, for example, a monitored sex offender too closely approaches a preset exclusion zone such as a playground.

According to ABI Research senior analyst of wireless connectivity Philip Solis, such examples show that this single technology has the flexibility to be included in a huge variety of applications. "In the fishing-grounds of Asia, GPS tracking of fishing boats’ locations is being used to resolve territorial fishery disputes. Some U.S. army ordnance now uses GPS to replace the glowing tracer bullets previously used for targeting," he said.

Full Story: http://www.govtech.net/magazine/channel_story.php/94454

Posted in:

Sorry, we couldn't find any posts. Please try a different search.

Leave a Comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.