Ford Global Technolgoies, LLC

Ford Motor Company Limited

Denso International America, Inc.

Cynthia M Neubecker

Brad Alan Ignaczak

Brian Bennie

Somak Datta Gupta

Adil Nizam Siddiqui

Jonathan Diedrich

Perry Robinson Macneille

Cheri Lyn Hansen

Pietro Buttolo

Jayanthi Rao

Robert Parenti

Haron Abdel-raziq

John Robert Van Wiemeersch

Omar Makke

Pramita Mitra

Mahmoud Yousef Ghannam

Oliver Lei

Thomas Lee Miller

Allen R Murray

Eric L Reed

Dehua Cui

Joshua R Wheeler

Scott Alan Watkins

David Allen Kowalski

Randy Michael Freiburger

Kenneth James Miller

Jeffrey Thomas Remillard

Scott Andrew Amman

John Shutko

Laura Viviana Hazebrouck

Jakob Nikolaus Hoellerbauer

Noorulla Mohammed

David Hiskens

Charles James Miller

Ali Hassani

Oleg Yurievitch Gusikhin

Kyle Golsch

Sibu Varughese

Justin McBride

Martin Nespolo

Yu Zhang

Anthony Gerald King

Vikas Upmanue

Ranjani Rangarajan

Nicholas Colella

Andrea Bowes Chowanic

Mark Gehrke

Laith Daman

Deepa Ramaswamy

Perry Robinson MacNeille

Jeffry Allen Greenberg

Jon M Speigle

James Andrew Miloser

Jacob Lucero

Parrish F Hanna

David Graham Smith

Thomas Chrapkiewicz

Lidia Van Moen

Andrea Bowers Chowanic

Graham Smith

Systems and methods for assisting visually impaired passengers, e.g., blind passengers, using rideshare services is provided. The system may identify a visually impaired passenger from image data captured by one or more exterior cameras of a rideshare vehicle, e.g., by detection of use of a cane by the passenger. The system may then generate audible instructions that may be emitted via exterior and interior speakers of the vehicle or via a wirelessly paired headset worn by the passenger, to guide the passenger to the vehicle entrance and to an available passenger seat within the vehicle. The system further may detect obstacles or features in the path of the passenger, and emit audible alerts to guide the passenger around the obstacle or feature.

Systems and methods for guiding a visually impaired passenger using rideshare services

A system receives vehicle sensor data indicating upcoming route characteristics as a vehicle travels a route. The system identifies one or more passibility-limiting features from the vehicle sensor data and, based on the sensor data, interpolates at least one characteristics of at least one feature that would affect vehicle travel. The system determines if the feature has been previously identified by comparison to previously identified features associated with locations within a proximity of a present location of the vehicle. Further, the system determines if the at least one characteristic has more than a predefined deviance from one or more previously interpolated characteristics associated with the feature and alert the user via the vehicle if at least one of the previously interpolated characteristics or the at least one characteristic indicates that the vehicle may have difficulty passing the feature based on predefined parameters of the vehicle.

Path geometry based on vehicle sensing

A help system is provided for a vehicle occupant who carries a mobile communication device. The vehicle has a transceiver providing two-way wireless telecommunication and which detects a loss-of-signal condition. A powertrain system provides vehicle movement and is configured for reckoning a path traversed by the vehicle. The help system includes a guidance controller and an interface adapted to connect to the mobile communication device. The guidance controller is configured to A) identify a crossing point when the transceiver detects an initiation of the loss-of-signal condition, B) store a breadcrumb route for returning to the crossing point based on the reckoned path, C) detect a stranded condition of the vehicle during the loss-of-signal condition, D) generate guidance instructions including the breadcrumb route from the vehicle back to the crossing point when the stranded condition is detected, and E) transfer the guidance instructions to the mobile communication device.

Stranded motorist assistance system

A computer includes a processor and a memory, and the memory stores instructions executable by the processor to receive first environmental data recorded by an environmental sensor on board a vehicle, receive nonenvironmental data recorded on board the vehicle independently of the first environmental data, add a plurality of annotations derived from the nonenvironmental data to the environmental data, and train a machine-learning program to process second environmental data by using the first environmental data as training data and the annotations as ground truth for the first environmental data.

Automatically generating machine-learning training data

A system includes a computer including a processor and a memory storing instructions executable by the processor to detect a position of a head of an occupant within a passenger compartment of a vehicle. The instructions include instructions to conduct a hearing test based on the position of the head of the occupant. The instructions include instructions to output sound at least at one of a specified frequency or amplitude, the specified frequency or amplitude selected based on results of the hearing test.

In-vehicle hearing test

Method and system for providing a mobility service is described. The mobility service can include delivering goods in rough terrain, rural areas, and other similar environments, by selecting and configuring vehicles for terrain considerations based on known and dynamically changing information. The disclosed system can include a vehicle configured with a deployable autonomous drone, and can determine optimized vehicle routes to remote locations using the deployable drone and vehicle navigation sensors, for real time mapping that can be combined with existing map/terrain data. The terrain data may also be sent to a vehicle in a vehicle fleet, and/or to a cloud-based server, and be used to compute the best available vehicles designed for the mobility service. The system may deploy one or more mobility solutions, collect telematics, road information, navigational data, and other information during the delivery. This feedback may then be used for future mobility services.

Rugged terrain vehicle design and route optimization

The disclosure generally pertains to systems and methods for providing off-road track drivability guidance. In an example scenario, a processor receives a sensor signal that is generated when a vehicle is driven on an off-road track. The processor evaluates the sensor signal to obtain information about a driving surface of the off-road track such as, a material composition, a gradient, and/or an amount of provided traction. The processor conveys the information to another processor (which may be a part of a server computer) that determines a drivability status of the off-road track based on the information about the driving surface and additional parameters, such as present and/or future weather conditions. The server computer may provide the drivability status in response to a query from a processor that is located in another vehicle (or in a personal communication device carried by a driver of the vehicle).

Systems and methods for providing off-track drivability guidance

Methods and apparatus for vehicle-based drone charging are disclosed herein. A vehicle-based drone charging apparatus includes a charging device to be operatively coupled to a vehicle. The charging device is to charge a drone in response to the drone being operatively coupled to the charging device. The vehicle-based drone charging apparatus further includes a communication interface to be operatively coupled to the vehicle. The communication interface is to broadcast use information associated with the charging device. The use information includes location information associated with a location of the vehicle and fee information associated with a cost for use of the charging device.

Methods and apparatus for vehicle-based drone charging

A dynamic navigation coach system is programmed to monitor and assist drivers while keeping them engaged en route to the destination. The system may provide driver navigation assistance and training that monitors user navigational skills, driving habits, and environmental factors, and provides dynamically adjustable tools to provide varying levels of navigation assistance in a game play format. The system may selectively provide navigational directions or corrections to the driver when the driver deviates from a scheduled travel route, instead of providing instructions at every driving event.

Interactive vehicle navigation coaching system

A container includes a transportation section and a drone section. The drone section has a drone place holder and a door. The drone place holder is accessible when the door is in an open position. The container includes a processor that is programmed to actuate the door to the open position, actuate a drone, fittable in the drone place holder, to fly out of the container, and actuate the drone to transport the container to a destination.

Drone-based goods transportation

Hidden camera detection systems and methods are disclosed herein. An example method includes illuminating a surface with infrared light, obtaining an image of the surface using an infrared camera, and determining the presence of a hidden camera associated with the surface by determining a difference in spectral reflectance between how the infrared light is reflected off of the hidden camera as compared to how the infrared light is reflected off of the surface.

Hidden camera detection systems and methods

Vehicles that are autonomous or human-operated may drive in a platoon to achieve energy savings. A leader vehicle receives information broadcasts from following vehicles that include a state of energy and one or more other values such as energy usage rates, range, destination, and aerodynamic properties. The leader vehicle may then determine an ordering of vehicles that increases the range of the platoon, e.g., reduces the number of refueling/recharging stops of the platoon. Other considerations for ordering the vehicles may include overall energy savings and a fair distribution of energy savings. A desired ordering may be achieved by transmitting swap commands to pairs of vehicles until the platoon is in the correct ordering.

Range-based vehicle platoon ordering

A computer is programmed to determine a trajectory of a moving target based on data from one or more vehicle sensors. The computer is programmed to deploy an aerial drone from the vehicle to track the moving target based on the determined trajectory.

Drone-based tracking

Real-time wind data for a location is determined based on a detected movement of an object relative to a vehicle. The real-time wind data includes a wind speed and a wind direction. Upon receiving stored wind data for the location from a remote computer, a crosswind risk is determined based on the real-time wind data and the stored wind data. A vehicle component is actuated to compensate for the crosswind risk.

Crosswind risk determination

A computer includes a processor and a memory storing instructions executable by the processor to receive sensor data of an occupant of a vehicle, identify a type of mask worn by the occupant based on the sensor data, select a sound filter according to the type of mask from a plurality of sound filters stored in the memory, receive sound data, apply the selected sound filter to the sound data, and perform an operation using the filtered sound data.

Speech filtering for masks

Growing community of inventors

Westland, MI, United States of America

Cynthia M Neubecker