Methods and apparatus for stationary object detection

• US 20030004644A1
• Filed: 08/19/2002
• Published: 01/02/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 08/06/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Telanon, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Telanon, Inc.
• Inventors: Farmer, Bennie
• Granted Patent: US 6,832,156 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/301
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/16 Control of distance between vehicles, e.g. keeping a distance to preceding vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 13/931 of land vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/9321 Velocity regulation, e.g. cruise control
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/9322 using additional data, e.g. driver condition, road state or weather data
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 7/41 using analysis of echo signal for target characterisation; Target signature; Target cross-section
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/255 Detecting or recognising potential candidate objects based on visual cues, e.g. shapes
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0962 having an indicator mounted inside the vehicle, e.g. giving voice messages
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/164 Centralised systems, e.g. external to vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/165 for passive traffic, e.g. including static obstacles, trees

Abstract

The present invention provides systems and methods for measuring the likelihood that detected stationary objects are not normally present at a sensed location. Such systems and methods may be used by other systems to which information from the present invention are communicated, for minimizing nuisance alerts in onboard object detection systems such as collision warning, collision avoidance, and/or adaptive cruise control systems. The system includes at least one vehicle mounted sensor capable of sensing at least a target object and providing data related to the target object. The system also comprises a locating device which is capable of determining and providing data related to the location of the machine or vehicle and a processing unit which receives the data from the sensor and the data from the locating device. The processing unit is configured to determine a probability estimate or measure of likelihood that the target object is not a normally present object based upon a comparison to previously recorded data from a reference storage device. The reference storage device stores the previously recorded data acquired from at least one similar sensor and a vehicle locating device while operating in the same geographic area, or stores data derived from such previously recorded data. The invention may enhance vehicle collision warning, collision avoidance and/or adaptive cruise control systems as examples.

Claims

1. A process to develop a reference database in conjunction with a system for stationary object detection, comprising the steps of:

1) acquiring signals from at least one sensor, said sensor capable of sensing target objects and generating data related to said target objects;

2) storing said data from said at least one sensor in a temporary storage buffer;

3) determining the location of said at least one sensor; and

4) indexing said data with respect to at least one of said target object data or said sensor location for subsequent comparison to real time data acquired from at least one sensor located on a mobile machine or vehicle to evaluate whether said target object is or is not a normally-present object.

2. The process according to claim 1, further comprising the steps of:

acquiring data from a vehicle locating device associated with said vehicle as said vehicle travels along a path providing said data from said at least one sensor to a collision warning system associated with said vehicle, said collision warning system generating signals indicating a possible collision of said vehicle with an obstacle; and

monitoring the signals from said collision avoidance system to a man-machine interface; and

permanently capturing said data from said at least one sensor and said vehicle locating device in response to a stationary target warning message from said collision avoidance system to said man-machine interface wherein said stationary target warning message relates to a non-collision situation or nuisance alert.

3. The process of claim 1 wherein said process is repeated more than once and includes a final step of combining the data from at least one sensor and said vehicle locating device from said path at a location which generated a nuisance alert in a manner increasing the confidence in said data.

4. A process of creating a reference database comprising:

1) obtaining sensor data of a target using at least one sensor device;

2) obtaining vehicle location data using a vehicle location device;

3) recording said sensor data and said vehicle location data for a selected time period within which a nuisance alert is generated by a vehicle collision avoidance system;

4) repeating steps 1-3 for a particular segment of the path of said vehicle; and

5) creating a database in which said particular segment in which said nuisance alert was generated is indexed using predetermined criteria.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein said sensor data of a target object comprises a target number, a fast Fourier transform number, a distance to the target, an azimuth angle to the target, a magnitude of sensor return and a quality indicator.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein said vehicle location data comprises a latitude, a longitude, a heading, a velocity and a time.

7. A reference database comprising:

records of associated data, each of said records containing at least sensor location data for a radar-based sensor and at least a distance and an azimuth angle to a stationary object relative to said sensor location.

8. The reference database of claim 7, further comprising

said records include a sensor signal return magnitude, and said azimuth angle is for all target objects along a path of said vehicle that were responsible for a nuisance alert during data capture.

9. The reference database of claim 7, wherein said data are retrievable by sensor location for each observation record.

10. The reference database of claim 7, wherein said data further comprise a stationary target object location, and wherein each of said records is retrievable by said stationary target object location.

11. The referenced database of claim 7, wherein said data resides on a replaceable permanent storage medium, wherein said database is updated by replacing said permanent storage medium with an updated version.

12. The reference database of claim 7 wherein said data is transmitted to a temporary storage medium located on a mobile machine or vehicle by wireless communications.