Driver Intention Monitoring for Safe Road-Shoulder Vehicle Stop

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Solution Overview

Problem

Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) lack the capability to effectively monitor a driver's intention and safely control the vehicle when the driver is no longer capable or willing to drive, leading to potential accidents due to drowsiness or carelessness.

Innovation Solution

A vehicle control system that utilizes a combination of cameras, sensors, and an electronic control unit to analyze the driver's face and pupils, warning the driver of drowsy or careless behavior and, if necessary, guiding the vehicle to stop on a road shoulder, incorporating sensors for vehicle dynamics, around view monitoring, and navigation to ensure safe driving.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If the ADAS monitors driver status using existing systems, then driver safety can be improved, but the system cannot accurately detect driver intention leading to false positives

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvedriver safetyVSAvoiddriver intention detection accuracy
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSMeasurement precision

Solution Approach 1:

The patent segments the driver monitoring task into multiple independent analysis components: face image analysis for basic driver status, pupil image analysis for intention detection, and steering angle analysis for validation. Each component processes specific features separately before integrating results, improving detection accuracy by avoiding single-point failure and reducing false positives through multi-factor verification.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

2Measurement precision

If multiple sensors are added to improve driver status monitoring, then detection accuracy is improved, but system complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvedriver status monitoring accuracyVSAvoidsystem complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent makes the image processing system multi-functional by using the same camera and image processing pipeline for both face analysis and pupil analysis. The single imaging system serves multiple purposes: capturing driver face for status monitoring, capturing pupil movements for intention detection, and providing images for both functions simultaneously. This reduces hardware complexity while maintaining high measurement precision through software-based multi-functionality.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #6Universality (Multi-functionality)

Data Source

PatentEP3489066B1Method for controlling vehicle based on condition of driver
Publication Date: 2024.07.17 MANDO MOBILITY SOLUTIONS CORP
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AI summary

A method for controlling a vehicle based on a driver status isdisclosed. The vehicle includes various sensing devices (including a camera, a vehicle dynamics sensor, a vehicle around view monitoring (AVM) camera, a periphery surveillance sensor, and a navigation device) and an electronic control unit (ECU). The ECU may analyze a driver status through the driver's face and pupils recognized by output signals of the sensing devices. If the driver has no intention to drive the vehicle, the ECU may control the vehicle to stop on a road shoulder, resulting in guarantee of safer driving.