Design, verification and failure diagnosis of wireless communication protocols for the AHS

The paper presents protocols for a design concerned with inter-platoon and intra-platoon communications in an automated highway system (AHS) framework. The protocols model vehicle manoeuvres in the form of communications, coordination and regulation environmental processes. An automatic verification tool, COSPAN, was used to verify the logical correctness of the discrete event system model as well as safety and liveness properties. The overall design is hybrid incorporating both discrete and continuous dynamics. The vehicles use a LAN for inter-platoon communications and a WAN for intra-platoon communications. Consequently, each vehicle is equipped with two RF radio modems. The automated vehicle operating on an AHS can develop various communication faults. The paper provides two examples illustrating a model-based failure diagnosis method which can be used for communication fault diagnosis.