Vehicle Beam Tracking via Dynamic Antenna Reconfiguration
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing wireless communication systems face challenges in efficiently maintaining and updating communication links between vehicles and other objects due to changes in environment, such as movement, requiring frequent beam alignment and tracking in V2V or V2X communications.
Innovation Solution
The method involves selecting and reconfiguring directional antennas based on beam tracking packets, steering angle, distance, vehicle velocity, and antenna orientation to optimize beam patterns for efficient communication link maintenance, using multi-element antenna arrays and sensors like radar and GPS for precise control.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If beamforming is used to establish communication links in V2V/V2X communications, then data throughput and communication reliability are improved, but the complexity of beam alignment and tracking increases due to vehicle movement and environmental changes
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic beam tracking by continuously monitoring vehicle position, velocity, and orientation from sensors (GPS, radar, IMU) and adjusting beamforming weights in real-time. The beam direction and width are dynamically adapted based on relative motion between vehicles, ensuring communication link maintenance despite movement. This resolves the contradiction by making the beamforming system adaptive rather than static, allowing high throughput to be maintained without requiring excessively complex manual alignment procedures.
Solution Approach 2:
The system employs feedback mechanisms where beam tracking packets are exchanged between vehicles to convey information about beam quality, signal strength, and required adjustments. The receiving vehicle provides feedback on link quality metrics, and the transmitting vehicle uses this feedback to refine beamforming parameters. This closed-loop feedback system automates the beam alignment process, reducing complexity while maintaining high data throughput through continuous optimization.
2Reliability
If frequent beam tracking updates are performed to maintain communication links during vehicle movement, then communication reliability is improved, but the consumption of communication resources and energy increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements periodic beam tracking updates at optimized intervals rather than continuous updates. Beam tracking packets are exchanged at specific time intervals or when threshold conditions are met (e.g., when vehicle position changes exceed a certain threshold). This periodic approach maintains communication reliability by updating beams when necessary while reducing energy consumption by avoiding unnecessary continuous updates during stable communication conditions.
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically adjusts beamforming parameters (beam width, direction, power) based on current communication conditions and vehicle motion state. When vehicles are moving rapidly or link quality degrades, parameters are adjusted more frequently. When conditions are stable, parameter changes are reduced. This adaptive parameter adjustment maintains reliability while optimizing energy consumption by matching the update rate to the actual need.
3Productivity
If directional antennas with narrow beam patterns are used to increase data throughput, then communication efficiency is improved, but the difficulty of maintaining link alignment during movement increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses narrow beam patterns for high throughput but compensates for their alignment difficulty through dynamic adaptation. Real-time sensor data from GPS, radar, and IMU systems continuously tracks vehicle position, velocity, and orientation. This dynamic information is used to automatically adjust beam direction and maintain alignment despite the narrow beam width. The system effectively makes the narrow beams track dynamically with vehicle movement, preserving both the throughput advantage of narrow beams and the ease of automatic alignment.
Solution Approach 2:
The beam alignment process is made self-service through automated beam tracking algorithms that use locally available sensor data to adjust beamforming parameters without external intervention. Each vehicle independently calculates required beam adjustments based on its own motion state and received beam tracking packets from the other vehicle. This self-service capability reduces the difficulty of maintaining alignment by eliminating manual intervention, allowing narrow beams to be used effectively for high throughput.
Data Source
AI summary
In some aspects, there is provided a method. The method may include selecting a first antenna coupled to a first transceiver at a first vehicle; determining a configuration of a first beam pattern emanated by the first antenna; and reconfiguring, based on the configuration of the first beam pattern and a beam tracking packet, the first antenna to provide a beam tracking of the first beam pattern. The first beam pattern may be associated with a wireless communication link to an object proximate to the first vehicle, which may be a second vehicle or a stationary object. Reconfiguring the first antenna may be further based on a steering angle associated with the first antenna and a distance between the first vehicle and the object proximate to the first vehicle.