Vehicle hazard detection and warning system

• US 10,246,065 B2
• Filed: 08/15/2016
• Issued: 04/02/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 12/29/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Thunder Power New Energy Vehicle Development Company Limited
• Original Assignee: Thunder Power New Energy Vehicle Development Company Limited
• Inventors: Dai, Yu-Ting
• Primary Examiner(s): Swarthout, Brent
• Application Number:
  US15/236,973
• Publication Number:
  US 20170182985A1
• Time in Patent Office: 960 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: B60T 2210/36 Global Positioning System [GPS]
• CPC Class Codes: B60T 7/16 operated by remote control, i.e. initiating means not mounted on vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: B60T 8/171 Detecting parameters used in the regulation; Measuring values used in the regulation
• CPC Class Codes: B60T 8/17551 determining control parameters related to vehicle stability used in the regulation, e.g. by calculations involving measured or detected parameters
• CPC Class Codes: B60T 8/17558 specially adapted for collision avoidance or collision mitigation road vehicle drive control systems for collision avoidance otherwise than by controlling a particular sub-unit B60W30/09
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2420/403 Image sensing, e.g. optical camera
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2520/105 Longitudinal acceleration
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2554/80 Spatial relation or speed relative to objects
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2556/45 External transmission of data to or from the vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2556/50 of positioning data, e.g. GPS [Global Positioning System] data
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/0956 the prediction being responsive to traffic or environmental parameters
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/14 Means for informing the driver, warning the driver or prompting a driver intervention
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0112 from the vehicle, e.g. floating car data [FCD]
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/096716 where the received information does not generate an automatic action on the vehicle control
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/096741 where the source of the transmitted information selects which information to transmit to each vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/096775 where the origin of the information is a central station
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/3822 specially adapted for use in vehicles H04B1/3827 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/724098 Interfacing with an on-board device of a vehicle for hands-free speaking in vehicles H04M1/6075
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/027 using movement velocity, acceleration information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/40 : for vehicles, e.g. vehicle-to-pedestrians [V2P]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/44 : for communication between vehicles and infrastructures, e.g. vehicle-to-cloud [V2C] or vehicle-to-home [V2H]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 : Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]

Abstract

Described herein is a vehicle system configured to identify and mitigate a risk associated with one or more hazards that may impact a vehicle. The vehicle system may include a service provider computer configured to maintain information related to one or more hazards. In some embodiments, a hazard may be identified based at least in part on its being located within the vicinity of a vehicle. In some embodiments, the service provider computer may generate a mitigation strategy to reduce or eliminate the risk posed by the identified hazard. The mitigation strategy may include one or more actions to be taken by a processor device within the vehicle. Upon being provided with a mitigation strategy, the processor device may execute one or more of the actions in the mitigation strategy without human interaction.

Claims

1. A vehicle apparatus, comprising:

one or more input sensors;

an antenna device; and

a processor device configured to;

receive input from the one or more input sensors, the input including a location of a vehicle;

provide the received input to a service provider computer via the antenna device, wherein the service provider is caused to;

determine, based on the location of the vehicle, at least one hazard in a vicinity of the vehicle apparatus, the at least one hazard identified by a second vehicle traveling ahead of the vehicle using one or more sensors of the second vehicle;

identify one or more risks associated with the at least one hazard;

identify one or more driver-specific factors associated with the driver of the vehicle; and

determine, based on the one or more driver-specific factors associated with a driving tendency of the driver of the vehicle in combination with the one or more risks, a strategy for mitigating the at least one hazard, the strategy including at least a first set of instructions and a second set of instructions; and

receive, from the service provider computer and in response to providing the received input, the first set of instructions to provide a notification of at least one hazard in the vicinity of the vehicle apparatus to an operator of the vehicle apparatus, and the second set of instructions to activate one or more driving components of the vehicle to mitigate a risk posed by the at least one hazard based on one or more driver-specific factors; and

execute each of the first set of instructions and the second set of instructions.

2. The vehicle apparatus of claim 1, further comprising an output device, wherein the processor device is further configured to provide the notification to the operator of the vehicle apparatus via the output device.

3. The vehicle apparatus of claim 1, wherein the antenna device is configured to enable communication via a cellular network.

4. The vehicle apparatus of claim 1, wherein the one or more input sensors includes a global positioning system device.

5. The vehicle apparatus of claim 4, wherein the input related to the location of the vehicle is a set of geographic coordinates.

6. The vehicle apparatus of claim 1, wherein each of the first set of instructions and the second set of instructions are executed at predetermined distances from the at least one hazard in the vicinity of the vehicle apparatus.

7. A method comprising:

receiving, from one or more input sensors, input information related to a vehicle, the input information including at least a location information;

determining, based at least in part on the received input information, a hazard that the vehicle is projected to encounter, the hazard identified by a second vehicle traveling ahead of the vehicle using one or more sensors of the second vehicle;

identifying one or more risks associated with the at least one hazard;

identifying one or more driver-specific factors associated with a driving tendency of the driver of the vehicle;

determining, based at least in part on the one or more driver-specific factors associated with the driver of the vehicle in combination with the one or more risks, a plurality of actions to be taken by the vehicle to mitigate a risk associated with the hazard, the plurality of actions including;

a first action to provide a notification to a driver of the vehicle; and

a second action to increase a brake sensitivity of the vehicle in accordance with the one or more driver-specific factors; and

providing, instructions to execute the plurality of actions to the vehicle, such that the instructions cause the vehicle to execute the first action at a first predetermined distance from the hazard and to execute the second actions at a second predetermined distance from the hazard.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the indication of the a plurality of actions includes a set of computer executable instructions.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the plurality of actins also includes a third action to activate a braking system of the vehicle at a third predetermined distance from the hazard.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein each of the first predetermined distance and the second predetermined distance are different distances.

11. The method of claim 7, wherein each predetermined distance from the hazard is included in the instructions to execute the respective action.

12. The method of claim 7, wherein the risk associated with the hazard is a risk that a vehicle function will be affected by the hazard.

13. The method of claim 7, wherein the a plurality of actions is determined based at least in part on an attribute of a driver of the vehicle.

14. A vehicle system, comprising:

a processor device; and

a memory including instructions that, when executed with the processor device, cause the system to, at least;

receive an indication of a location associated with a vehicle;

identify, based at least in part on the received indication, at least one hazard within a vicinity of the vehicle, the at least one hazard identified by a second vehicle traveling ahead of the vehicle using one or more sensors of the second vehicle;

identify one or more risks associated with the at least one hazard;

identify one or more driver-specific factors associated with a driving tendency of the driver of the vehicle;

determine, based on the one or more driver-specific factors associated with the driver of the vehicle in combination with the one or more risks, a set of safety protocols calculated to mitigate the hazard, the set of safety protocols including;

a first protocol that includes instructions to provide a notification to a driver of the vehicle; and

a second protocol that includes instructions to cause a sensitivity of the braking system to increase in accordance with the one or more driver-specific factors; and

provide the set of safety protocols to the vehicle, wherein the vehicle is configured to execute the first protocol upon reaching a first predetermined distance from the hazard and to execute the second protocol upon reaching a second predetermined distance from the hazard.

15. The vehicle system of claim 14, wherein the instructions further cause the system to at least:

receive a second location associated with a second vehicle;

determine, based at least in part on input received from the second vehicle, that a second hazard has been encountered by the second vehicle; and

store information related to the second hazard in a memory with respect to the second location.

16. The vehicle system of claim 15, wherein the instructions further cause the system to at least:

determine that the second hazard is within the vicinity of the vehicle;

determine a second set of safety protocols calculated to mitigate the second hazard; and

provide the second set of safety protocols to the vehicle.

17. The vehicle system of claim 14, wherein the vicinity of the vehicle is a specific distance from the vehicle.

18. The vehicle system of claim 17, wherein the vicinity of the vehicle is a distance calculated based on the speed of the vehicle.

19. The vehicle system of claim 14, wherein the set of safety protocols also includes an instruction to activate a function of the vehicle.

20. The vehicle system of claim 14, wherein the vehicle system receives condition information for the vehicle, and the set of safety protocols is calculated to mitigate the hazard using the provided condition information.