Maplets for Real-Time Digital Map Updates
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing digital maps used by autonomous vehicles and ADAS systems are often outdated and lack real-time updates, failing to accurately reflect dynamic road conditions such as construction, obstructions, and traffic incidents, which can lead to navigation errors.
Innovation Solution
A system that crowdsources data from sensors on vehicles to generate and transmit 'maplets' – standardized data packets containing real-time road information, allowing for efficient updates of digital maps by encoding environment elements and vehicle trajectories, thereby ensuring the maps remain accurate and up-to-date.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If digital maps are updated frequently to reflect real-time road conditions, then navigation accuracy is improved, but system complexity and data processing requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the digital map into discrete segments or tiles that can be independently updated. Only specific map regions affected by road changes are updated rather than the entire map, reducing processing complexity while maintaining navigation accuracy in affected areas.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs partial updates by identifying and processing only the specific map regions where road conditions have changed. This selective updating approach reduces the overall data processing burden while ensuring accuracy where needed.
2Measurement precision
If real-time road condition data is collected from multiple vehicles, then map update accuracy is improved, but network bandwidth consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines data from multiple vehicle sensors into consolidated maplet files that contain aggregated road condition information. This merging reduces redundant data transmission while maintaining the accuracy benefits of multi-vehicle data collection.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of transmitting raw sensor data from each vehicle, the system creates compressed maplet representations that capture essential road condition changes. These compact copies convey the necessary information with reduced bandwidth consumption.
3Measurement precision
If comprehensive sensor data is processed to generate detailed maplets, then road information accuracy is improved, but data processing time increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts only the essential road condition information from comprehensive sensor data to create maplets. By taking out only the relevant features needed for navigation updates rather than processing all sensor data, processing time is reduced while maintaining accuracy.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent transforms detailed sensor data into standardized maplet parameters with specific data structures. This parameter transformation consolidates complex sensor readings into manageable formats that require less processing time while preserving critical road information.
Data Source
AI summary
An apparatus onboard a vehicle and in communication with sensors onboard the vehicle is configured to receive a maplet request identifying a request region; determine that the apparatus has entered the request region; process and fuse sensor data captured by two or more sensors of the sensors to generate a multi-sensor data stream comprising a plurality of observations corresponding to a portion of a road network; generate a maplet based on the multi-sensor data stream and the maplet request, wherein generating the maplet comprises using a predetermined data model to encode road data, from the multi-sensor data stream, corresponding to at least one environment element of the road network; and provide the maplet such that a network apparatus receives the maplet. The network apparatus is configured to (a) validate or (b) update map data of a digital map representing the road network based at least in part on the maplet.