Protolane-Based AV Intent Testing for Geonet Lane Coverage
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Solution Overview
Problem
The challenge of ensuring reliable operation of autonomous vehicles in various scenarios and environments without human intervention is critical for widespread adoption, as existing systems lack efficient methods to validate their decision-making capabilities across diverse road conditions.
Innovation Solution
The concept of protolanes is introduced to decompose roadways into manageable segments, allowing for the assignment of lane segments to protolanes based on shared test cases, thereby simplifying the testing and verification process by restricting it to scenarios that actually occur within a geonet, and enabling the reuse of tests across similar geonets.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If comprehensive testing of autonomous vehicles is conducted across all possible scenarios and environments, then reliability of operation is improved, but testing time and complexity increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the continuous roadway into discrete lane segments, which are then grouped into protolanes based on shared characteristics. This segmentation allows testing to focus on representative protolane scenarios rather than every possible lane configuration, reducing testing time while maintaining reliability through comprehensive coverage of segmented test cases.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates universal protolanes that can represent multiple actual lane segments across different geonets. A single protolane test case can validate autonomous vehicle behavior across numerous similar roadway configurations, enabling one test suite to serve multiple testing purposes and significantly reducing overall testing requirements.
2Measurement precision
If testing is conducted for every unique lane segment configuration across all geonets, then measurement precision of vehicle performance is improved, but device complexity of the testing system increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges multiple lane segments with similar characteristics into unified protolanes. By combining geometrically similar lane segments from different geonets into a single protolane representation, the system maintains precise measurement capability across all configurations while reducing testing system complexity through consolidation of redundant test cases.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent transforms the testing approach by changing parameters from testing individual lane segment geometries to testing protolane scenarios defined by shared characteristics. This parameter transformation allows comprehensive measurement precision to be achieved through a smaller set of standardized test cases with varying parameters, rather than testing every unique configuration.
3Reliability
If extensive additional testing is performed to expand validated navigation to new areas, then reliability in new environments is improved, but productivity of deployment is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent performs preliminary action by pre-defining protolanes and their associated test cases before deployment to new geonets. When expanding to new areas, the system can quickly match new lane segments to existing protolanes and reuse validated test results, eliminating the need for extensive additional testing and enabling rapid deployment while maintaining reliability.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent enables copying of validated protolane test results from one geonet to another. Once a protolane is validated in one geographic network, the same test case can be copied and applied to similar protolanes in new areas, significantly accelerating deployment productivity while maintaining reliable performance through proven test coverage.
Data Source
AI summary
Disclosed herein are system, method, and computer program product aspects for testing autonomous vehicle intent using protolanes. For example, the method includes selecting a first lane segment of a roadway within a geonet, wherein the geonet comprises a plurality of lane segments. It is determined that the first lane segment corresponds to a protolane of a set of protolanes, wherein the protolane is associated with one or more additional lane segments of the plurality of lane segments. The protolane is associated with the first lane segment based on the determination that the first lane segment corresponds to the protolane.