Cooperative Collision Detection Based on Future-Trajectory Prediction

Collision Warning Systems (CWSs) are becoming an important part of vehicle active safety. Commercial CWSs using information measured by the subject vehicle have been available on trucks, buses and passenger cars. Another emerging trend in the development of CWS is based on the cooperative driving concept, where vehicles are equipped with absolute-positioning systems and inter-vehicle communications. The absolute positions, together with the rich information from vehicle motion sensors, facilitate the prediction of vehicle future trajectories. With the current positions and the predicted trajectories of the surrounding vehicles, each vehicle in principle can establish a comprehensive understanding and anticipation of its driving environment. To leverage these potential advantages of the cooperative driving concept, this paper proposes, designs and experiments a collision warning system based on vehicle future-trajectory prediction. A systematic approach with probability measures is designed to detect potential trajectory conflict between the predicted trajectories. Collision detection is then based on the potential trajectory conflicts with examination of their persistency and urgency. Experimental results are provided to verify the feasibility of the design.Copyright © 2006 by ASME