Ford Global Technolgoies, LLC

Caterpillar Inc.

Argo Ai Gmbh

Volkswagen Group of America Investments, LLC

Ramadev Burigsay Hukkeri

Alice Kassar

Neal Andrew Seegmiller

Thomas M Petroff

Scott Julian Varnhagen

Thandava Krishna Edara

Albert Costa

Christopher Cunningham

Michael Allen Taylor

Michael D Braunstein

Shenglong Gao

Ghassan Atmeh

Brett Browning

Joshua Struble

Shubhashree Venkatesh

John Russell Lepird

Ananth Purushotham Kini

Scott Plant

Samir Med Kherat

Pragati Satpute

Jay Sidhu

Zhongkui Wang

Israel-Marc Kositsky

Dale Lord

Israel Marc Kositsky

Meal Seegmiller

Devices, systems, and methods are provided for counter-steering penalization. A device may analyze, by one or more processors, lane geometry associated with one or more lanes at a geographic location. The device may identify one or more corners in the lane geometry. The device may select one or more desired maximum steering angles of a steering wheel of an autonomous vehicle. The device may select weight values associated with the one or more desired maximum steering angles. The device may execute a path planning optimization based on the one or more desired maximum steering angles and the weight values.

Counter-steering penalization during vehicle turns

Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and computer program products for generating a reference path for an autonomous vehicle. The methods comprising: receiving, by a computing device, a reference trajectory for the autonomous vehicle; generating, by the computing device, a first alternative trajectory for the autonomous vehicle based on an objective identified by the reference trajectory; comparing, by the computing device, the first alternative trajectory to the reference trajectory or a previously generated alternative trajectory; selecting, by the computing device, whether to generate a second alternative trajectory based on a result of said comparing; and generating, by the computing device, the second alternative trajectory for the autonomous vehicle in response to said selecting.

Methods and systems for performing inter-trajectory re-linearization about an evolving reference path for an autonomous vehicle

Methods and systems for maneuvering an autonomous vehicle are disclosed. The methods include generating a multi-corridor representation corresponding to a local region around the autonomous vehicle while travelling on a route, and using the multi-corridor representation and perception data corresponding to the local region to generate a trajectory for the autonomous vehicle to traverse the local region. The multi-corridor representation includes a plurality of adjacent corridors that each include one or more lane segments of a road network. A location of executing a lane change along the route is determined dynamically during a trajectory generation phase based on the perception data.

Methods and systems for lane changes using a multi-corridor representation of local route regions

Disclosed herein are system, method, and computer program product aspects for enabling an autonomous vehicle (AV) to react to objects posing a risk to the AV. The system can monitor an object within a vicinity of the AV. A plurality of trajectories predicting paths the object will take can be generated, the plurality of trajectories being based on a plurality of inputs indicating current and past characteristics of the object. Using a learned model, a forecasted position of the object at an instance in time can be generated. An error value representing how accurate the forecasted position is versus an observed position of the object can be stored. Error values can be accumulated over a period of time. A risk factor can be assigned for the object based on the accumulated error values. A maneuver for the AV can be performed based on the risk factor.

Integrated trajectory forecasting, error estimation, and vehicle handling when detecting an observed scenario

Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and computer program products for controlling acceleration of a vehicle. The methods comprising: detecting, by a computing device, a lateral distance from a point on a trajectory of the vehicle to a first object the vehicle is expected to pass when following the trajectory, the first object being located off of and to a side of the trajectory and the point representing a future location of the vehicle while passing the first object; selecting, by the computing device, whether acceleration limiting is to be performed by the vehicle based on the lateral distance; obtaining an amount by which the acceleration of the vehicle is to be limited, when a selection is made that acceleration limiting is to be performed by the vehicle; and causing, by the computing device, the vehicle to perform operations for autonomous driving with limiting of acceleration by the obtained amount.

Systems and methods for controlling longitudinal acceleration based on lateral objects

Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and computer program products for controlling acceleration of a vehicle. The methods comprising: detecting a lateral distance from a point on a trajectory of the vehicle to an object the vehicle is expected to pass when following the trajectory, the object being located off of and to a side of the trajectory and the point representing a future location of the vehicle while passing the object; comparing the lateral distance to a threshold value; selecting whether acceleration limiting is to be performed by the vehicle based on whether the lateral distance is less than the threshold value; and causing the vehicle to perform operations for autonomous driving with or without acceleration limiting based on said selecting.

Devices, systems, and methods are provided for enhanced rider pairing of an autonomous vehicle (AV). A system may pair a first user profile of a first user located at a first location with a first autonomous vehicle (AV) to complete a trip to a destination selected by the first user. The system may detect a second AV at the first location, wherein the second AV is associated with a second user profile. The system may connect the second AV with the first user using a connection mechanism. The system may select a profile status of the first user profile based on the connection to the second AV. The system may pair the first user profile with the second AV based on the profile status.

Enhanced rider pairing for autonomous vehicles

Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and computer program products for biasing a trajectory of a vehicle. The methods comprise: identifying a lane biasing interval of a lane in which the vehicle is to travel based on a lane width; obtaining a first reference path of travel for the vehicle that passes through the lane biasing interval; generating a second reference path of travel for the vehicle using a plurality of lateral offsets and the first reference path of travel for the vehicle; and adjusting the trajectory of the vehicle using the second reference path of travel. The lateral offsets are based on a lateral offset from each index point of the first reference path that resides in the lane biasing interval.

Systems and methods for biasing a trajectory of an autonomous vehicle while moving in a lane

Systems and methods for generating a trajectory of a vehicle are disclosed. The methods include generating a spatial domain speed profile for a path represented as a sequence of poses of a vehicle between a first point and a second point. Generation of the spatial domain speed profile uses a longitudinal problem while excluding a derate interval on the path when speed of the vehicle cannot exceed a threshold. The methods further include generating a derate profile using the spatial domain speed profile and the derate interval, and transforming the derate interval to a temporal derate interval. The temporal derate interval may include time steps at which the speed of the vehicle cannot exceed the threshold while traversing the path, and may be used as an input to the longitudinal problem for generating a trajectory of the vehicle for navigating between the first point and the second point.

Systems and methods for controlling speed of an autonomous vehicle

Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and computer program products for controlling acceleration of a vehicle. The methods comprising: detecting a lateral distance from a point on a trajectory of the vehicle to a first object the vehicle is expected to pass when following the trajectory; selecting whether acceleration limiting is to be performed by the vehicle based on the lateral distance; obtaining a margin of the vehicle defined by a sequence of points; obtaining an amount by which the acceleration of the vehicle is to be limited based on the trajectory and the margin of the vehicle, when a selection is made that acceleration limiting is to be performed by the vehicle; and causing the vehicle to perform operations for autonomous driving with limiting of acceleration by the obtained amount.

A ride service system will determine a stopping location for an autonomous vehicle (AV) before the AV picks up a passenger in response to a ride service request. The system will determine a pickup area for the request, along with a loading point within a pickup area, and the AV will navigate along the route toward the pickup area. Before the AV reaches the pickup area, the system will determine whether it received a departure confirmation indicating that the passenger is at the loading point. If the system received the departure confirmation, the AV will navigate into the pickup area and stop at the loading point; otherwise, the AV will either (a) navigate to an intermediate stopping location before reaching the pickup area or (b) pass through the pickup area.

Method of navigating autonomous vehicle to passenger pickup / drop-off location

A method includes identifying an object that is invading a lane that an autonomous vehicle is occupying, and generating a constraint about a point of crossing, where the constraint has a direction and a length, and the point of crossing represents a location of where the object and the autonomous vehicle will collide if the object maintains its current trajectory and the autonomous vehicle maintains its current trajectory. The method includes applying the constraint to a motion plan associated with the autonomous vehicle, and issuing one or more commands to adjust movement of the autonomous vehicle in response to encountering the constraint.

Methods and systems for autonomous vehicle collision avoidance

Systems and methods of maneuvering an autonomous vehicle in a local region using topological planning, while traversing a route to a destination location, are disclosed. The system includes an autonomous vehicle including one or more sensors and a processor. The processor is configured to determine the local region on the route and receive real-time information corresponding to the local region. The processor performs topological planning to identify on or more topologically distinct classes of trajectories, compute a constraint set for each of the one or more topologically distinct classes of trajectories, optimize a trajectory to generate a candidate trajectory for each constraint set, and select a trajectory for the autonomous vehicle to traverse the local region from amongst the one or more candidate trajectories. Each of the one or more topologically distinct classes is associated with a plurality of trajectories that take the same combination of discrete actions with respect to objects in the local region.

Methods and systems for topological planning in autonomous driving

This document describes methods and systems for enabling an autonomous vehicle (AV) to determine a path to a stopping location. The AV will determine a desired stop location (DSL) that is associated with a service request. The AV's motion control system will move the AV along a path to the DSL. While moving along the path, the AV's perception system will detect ambient conditions near the DSL. The ambient conditions will be parameters associated with a stopping rule. The AV will apply the stopping rule to the ambient conditions to determine whether the stopping rule permits the AV to stop at the DSL. If the stopping rule permits the AV to stop at the DSL, the motion control system will move the AV to, and stop at, the DSL. Otherwise, the motion control system will not stop the AV at the DSL.

Determination of vehicle pullover location considering ambient conditions

A system of linearizing a trajectory of an autonomous vehicle about a reference path includes a computing device and a computer-readable storage medium. The computer-readable storage medium includes one or more programming instructions that, when executed, cause the computing device to receive a reference path for an autonomous vehicle, where the reference path defines a proposed trajectory for the autonomous vehicle in a Cartesian reference frame, identify an objective based on the received reference path, where the objective comprises a longitudinal component and a lateral component, project the objective into a curvilinear coordinate frame described by the received reference path, decouple the longitudinal component and the lateral component, linearize the lateral component about the reference path, generate a new reference path for the autonomous vehicle by fusing the linearized longitudinal component and the linearized lateral component, and map the new reference path back to the Cartesian reference frame.

Growing community of inventors

Pittsburgh, PA, United States of America

Ramadev Burigsay Hukkeri