Autonomous Vehicle Black Box With Raw and Compressed Buffers
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Solution Overview
Problem
Autonomous driving vehicles face challenges in recording and retaining raw sensor data due to high storage costs and potential data loss during power interruptions, especially when uncompressed data is required for accident analysis.
Innovation Solution
Implementing two cyclic buffers within the vehicle, one for raw data in volatile memory and another for compressed data in non-volatile memory, ensuring data retention during power disruptions and efficient storage of sensor data before and during events like collisions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If non-volatile memory is used to store vehicle sensor data, then data retention during power loss is improved, but storage cost increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the storage system into two distinct segments: a first cyclic buffer using volatile memory for uncompressed raw sensor data, and a second cyclic buffer using non-volatile memory for compressed sensor data. This segmentation allows each segment to serve its specific purpose - the volatile memory provides fast access for high-quality data while the non-volatile memory provides reliable storage for compressed data, thereby resolving the contradiction between data retention and storage cost.
2Measurement precision
If uncompressed sensor data is stored, then data quality for accident analysis is improved, but storage space requirement increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by storing uncompressed high-quality sensor data in the first cyclic buffer (volatile memory) where it is immediately accessible for analysis, while storing compressed data in the second cyclic buffer (non-volatile memory). This allows the system to maintain high data quality where needed (in volatile memory) while using compression to reduce storage space requirements in the non-volatile memory segment.
3Quantity of substance
If volatile memory is used to store sensor data, then storage cost is reduced, but data loss during power interruption occurs
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a copying mechanism where sensor data is simultaneously written to two different storage locations: the first cyclic buffer (volatile memory) and the second cyclic buffer (non-volatile memory). This creates redundant copies of the data in different memory types, so that if power is lost and volatile memory data is corrupted or lost, the compressed copy in non-volatile memory remains intact and can be used for analysis.
4Quantity of substance
If compressed sensor data is stored, then storage space is reduced, but data quality for analysis decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the storage system to handle different data quality requirements: uncompressed data in the first cyclic buffer maintains full quality for immediate analysis, while compressed data in the second cyclic buffer provides space-efficient storage. The segmentation allows the system to preserve data quality where it matters most (in volatile memory) while using compression to reduce storage space in the non-volatile memory segment.
Data Source
AI summary
An improved black box data recorder for use with autonomous driving vehicles (AVD). In one embodiment, two cyclic buffers are provided to record vehicle sensors data. A first cyclic buffer records raw vehicle sensor data on a volatile memory, while a second cyclic buffer records the same vehicle sensor data, as compressed data, on a non-volatile memory. In a case of a collision or near collision, in one embodiment the buffers are flushed into a non-volatile (NV) storage for retrieval. As long as there is no power interruption, the raw vehicle sensor data will be accessible from the NV storage. If a power interruption occurs, the raw vehicle sensor data held in the volatile memory of the first cyclic buffer will be lost and only the compressed form of the vehicle sensor data from the NV second cyclic buffer will survive and be accessible.