Vehicle Collision Avoidance Using Driver Field of View Estimation
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Drivers often fail to check for other vehicles at traffic intersections when they have priority, leading to crashes due to hidden or unobserved traffic, and may not be prepared for sudden slow-downs on highways, resulting in collisions.
Innovation Solution
A host vehicle equipped with sensors and processing circuitry that maps its location, receives traffic information, estimates the driver's field of view, and modifies operations to ensure safe navigation through intersections, overtaking, and speed management on highways by alerting or automatically adjusting speed to prevent collisions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If drivers rely on their own field of view at intersections, then they maintain operational simplicity, but they cannot detect hidden or unobserved traffic leading to crashes
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces sensors as an intermediary between the driver and the external environment. These sensors capture visual information from areas beyond the driver's field of view, including hidden traffic at intersections. The captured images are then processed by image processing circuitry that identifies potential collisions and alerts the driver, thus mediating the detection gap without requiring the driver to manually check all directions.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces the mechanical human visual inspection process with an automated sensor-based detection system. Instead of relying on the driver's physical ability to turn and look in different directions, the system uses sensors to continuously capture images and image processing circuitry to automatically analyze them for potential collision risks, substituting the mechanical human action with an automated electronic system.
2Productivity
If drivers maintain high speed on highways, then productivity is improved, but they cannot react to sudden slow-downs due to limited field of view
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements preliminary detection of potential hazards by continuously capturing images with sensors and processing them to identify objects that may become collision risks. The system performs this detection in advance, allowing the driver to be alerted before a situation becomes critical, thus enabling preventive action rather than reactive response.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent establishes a feedback loop where sensors continuously monitor the environment, image processing circuitry analyzes the captured images, and the system provides alerts to the driver based on detected potential collisions. This closed-loop feedback mechanism enables the driver to maintain high speed while receiving real-time information about emerging hazards that are beyond normal visual range.
3Productivity
If drivers attempt to overtake preceding vehicles, then productivity is improved, but they risk collision with oncoming vehicles hidden by obstacles
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses sensors as an intermediary to detect oncoming vehicles that may be hidden by obstacles such as hills or curves. The sensors capture images of areas that would normally be invisible to the driver, and the image processing circuitry analyzes these images to identify potential oncoming traffic, providing an intermediary detection capability that eliminates the need for the driver to visually clear the obstacle area.
Data Source
AI summary
A host vehicle including a plurality of sensors communicably coupled to the host vehicle. Additionally, the host vehicle includes processing circuitry configured to map-match a location of the host vehicle while the host vehicle is operating on a highway, receive obstruction information from the plurality of sensors, the plurality of sensors having a predetermined field of view corresponding to a host vehicle field of view, estimate a driver field of view based on the host vehicle field of view, determine whether a speed of the host vehicle is safe based on the driver field of view and the obstruction information, and modify driver operation in response to a determination that the speed of the host vehicle is not safe based on the driver field of view.