Simulated Teammate Navigation Estimation During AV Communication Denial

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Solution Overview

Problem

Existing autonomous vehicle (AV) mission systems face challenges in maintaining effective team coordination during communication denial, leading to inaccurate teammate navigation state predictions and disrupted mission operations in contested battle spaces and urban environments.

Innovation Solution

A mission system that includes a plurality of controllers on AVs, where mission data is shared and stored, and a simulated teammate guidance and avoidance module generates estimated navigation states and trajectories for teammate AVs during communication denial, ensuring high-fidelity forecasting and seamless mission continuation.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If communication signals are transmitted between AVs, then team coordination is maintained, but communication denial disrupts coordination and causes loss of information

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveteam coordination reliabilityVSAvoidteammate navigation state information
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSLoss of information

Solution Approach 1:

The patent creates a simulated copy of the teammate guidance and avoidance module that runs on the ownship AV. This simulation replicates the teammate's decision-making logic and generates predicted navigation states without requiring actual communication. The simulation copy allows the system to maintain coordination reliability by producing accurate teammate state estimates even when communication is denied.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #26Copying

Solution Approach 2:

The system pre-loads and stores the teammate guidance and avoidance module software on each AV before mission deployment. This preliminary action ensures that when communication denial occurs, the AV already has the necessary computational tools locally available to generate accurate predictions, eliminating the need for real-time data exchange and maintaining coordination during outages.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

2Measurement precision

If simulated teammate guidance module is executed locally, then accurate navigation state prediction is achieved during communication denial, but computational complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvenavigation state estimation accuracyVSAvoidcontroller computational complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent extracts the essential navigation state prediction functionality from the full teammate guidance and avoidance module, implementing only the critical components needed for accurate state estimation. By taking out and implementing only the necessary simulation elements locally, the system achieves high measurement precision while managing computational complexity through selective implementation of module functions.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

Data Source

PatentEP4239433A1High fidelity teammate state estimation for coordinated autonomous operations in communications denied environments
Publication Date: 2023.09.06 ROCKWELL COLLINS INC
  • EP4239433A1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP4239433A1 patent drawingFigure 2
  • EP4239433A1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

A mission system for autonomous vehicle (AV) team coordination and a method of using the same are disclosed. A controller included on an AV shares mission data between two or more AVs, and in response to communication denial, generates estimated navigation trajectories for AVs (102a-c). A simulation outputs estimated navigation states for the AVs (102a-c). The estimated navigation states are identical or substantially identical to navigation states otherwise generated by controllers (104a-c) included on the AVs (102a-c). The estimated navigation trajectories are generated based on the estimated navigation states.