Companies like Goodyear Tire & Rubber and Bridgestone aim to equip the tires of autonomous vehicles with sensors that can gather and relay data on friction and road conditions, helping the vehicles decide, for instance, how fast to take a turn or how soon to start braking.

But before that, these companies face a number of complications, including how to power the process and how to integrate data from the tires with feeds from other data-collection sources on the vehicle. Typically, autonomous vehicles are equipped with a configuration of radar, laser-emitting lidar and cameras to paint a real-time picture of street, traffic and other ambient conditions…

Powering the sensors is one of the biggest obstacles to making that happen.