Adaptive Vehicular Headlamp Control for Glare Suppression
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing vehicular headlamps emit light in a pattern that can cause glare to drivers of other vehicles, particularly when a dark region overlaps with a retroreflective object, such as a pedestrian or road sign, due to uneven light intensity distribution.
Innovation Solution
A vehicular headlamp with multiple light emitting units and a control unit that adjusts the light intensity of specific regions based on detected objects in front of the vehicle, attenuating light in areas that overlap or are adjacent to the object to reduce glare.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If light is emitted in a distribution pattern including a dark region to avoid glare, then glare suppression is improved, but the periphery of the dark region becomes bright due to light from adjacent regions, reducing the effectiveness of glare suppression
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by controlling different light emitting units to have different light intensity characteristics. Specifically, light emitting units that would normally illuminate the dark region are made to emit light with lower intensity compared to units illuminating other regions, creating a localized quality difference that prevents peripheral brightness while maintaining central dark region effectiveness
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the light intensity parameter of specific light emitting units based on their spatial relationship to the dark region. Light emitting units adjacent to the dark region are assigned a lower light intensity parameter than units farther away, dynamically adjusting the illumination pattern to suppress peripheral brightness while maintaining adequate overall lighting
2Illumination intensity
If light emitting units adjacent to the dark region emit light with normal intensity, then overall illumination is improved, but glare is given to drivers of other vehicles in the dark region where objects overlap
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements local quality by creating a differentiated light intensity profile across the light emitting units. Units whose light would reach the dark region are assigned lower intensity, while other units maintain normal intensity, achieving both adequate overall illumination and localized glare suppression in the dark region
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the light emitting units into different functional groups based on their spatial relationship to the dark region. One group is designated to illuminate the dark region with reduced intensity, while another group illuminates other areas with normal intensity, allowing independent control of illumination and glare suppression functions
Data Source
AI summary
A vehicular headlamp (1) includes a plurality of light emitting elements (33) and a control unit (CO), in which the control unit (CO) attenuates, when an object is located in front of a host vehicle (100), a light amount of light emitted from one part of light emitting units, which are the light emitting elements (33d) to (33g) each irradiating a first region (91) with light having a higher light intensity than that of a region other than the first region (91), and a light amount of light emitted from another part of the light emitting units, which are the light emitting elements (33c) and (33h) each irradiating a second region (92) with light having a higher light intensity than that of a region other than the second region (92), as compared with a case where an object is not located in front of the host vehicle (100).