Roadside Sensing Infrastructure for Vehicle Fault-Tolerant Perception
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing vehicle systems face challenges in achieving robustness against component and system failure modes, particularly in ensuring safe navigation at various levels of autonomy, which is difficult to achieve with conventional redundant sensing subsystems.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of an offboard infrastructure system that deploys infrastructure units along roads, equipped with sensor systems and computation systems, to capture and process data about road segments, objects, and events, providing this data to vehicles to enhance their sensing, perception, and prediction capabilities.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional redundant sensing subsystems are installed in vehicles to achieve robustness against component and system failure modes, then reliability is improved, but device complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an offboard infrastructure system as an intermediary between the vehicle and the environment. This infrastructure includes roadside units with sensors and computation systems that capture and process data about road segments, objects, and events, then provide this data to vehicles. This mediator approach allows the vehicle to achieve robustness without carrying all redundant sensing equipment onboard, as the infrastructure serves as an external backup sensing system.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent shifts the redundancy from the vehicle dimension to the infrastructure dimension. Instead of having redundant sensors on each vehicle, the system creates a distributed network of sensing points along the road. This dimensional shift allows the same level of reliability to be achieved through spatial distribution in the environment rather than through duplication within each vehicle system.
2Reliability
If diverse redundancy is provided through offboard infrastructure to enhance robustness, then reliability is improved, but infrastructure complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The offboard infrastructure units are designed to serve multiple functions: they act as sensing systems for the vehicle, as communication relays, and as computation nodes. Each roadside unit can serve multiple vehicles simultaneously and can provide various types of data (sensor data, object detection, event information). This multi-functionality reduces the need for specialized dedicated systems for each function, thereby reducing overall infrastructure complexity while maintaining reliability.
3Measurement precision
If sensor systems and computation systems are deployed on infrastructure units along roads, then sensing and perception capabilities are enhanced, but manufacturing and deployment cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The infrastructure system is divided into discrete, modular units deployed at specific segments or locations along the road rather than as a continuous system. Each infrastructure unit is a self-contained module with sensors and computation capabilities that can be manufactured and deployed independently. This segmentation allows for phased deployment, reducing upfront costs, and enables standardized manufacturing of modular units that can be produced more efficiently than custom integrated systems.
Data Source
AI summary
Methods, systems, and non-transitory computer readable media are configured to perform operations comprising capturing, by a computing system, sensor data associated with a segment of a road, the computing system disposed on a structure associated with the road; detecting, by the computing system, objects in the segment of the road based on the sensor data; and providing, by the computing system, data associated with the detected objects to a vehicle travelling in the segment of the road.