Method and system for producing an up-to-date situation depiction

• US 9,373,255 B2
• Filed: 05/06/2013
• Issued: 06/21/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 05/16/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Continental Teves AG & Co. OHG (Continental AG)
• Original Assignee: Continental Teves AG & Co. OHG (Continental AG)
• Inventors: Strau, Matthias, Sthlin, Ulrich
• Primary Examiner(s): BUTLER, RODNEY ALLEN
• Application Number:
  US14/400,868
• Publication Number:
  US 20150127249A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,142 Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0112 from the vehicle, e.g. floating car data [FCD]
• 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

Abstract

The invention relates to a method for creating a current situation depiction, particularly a current city-center situation depiction, in which environment data and/or map data and/or position data describing a locally bounded situation are sent to a database by a multiplicity of vehicles using vehicle-to-X communication means. The environment data are captured by means of ambient sensors and/or vehicle sensors, the map data are read from a digital memory, and the position data are determined at least by means of a global satellite position system. The method is distinguished in that the environment data and/or the map data and/or the position data are continually merged with a situation depiction that is already present in the database to form a current situation depiction, and both the database and the situation depiction are fixed in location. The invention also relates to an appropriate system.

Claims

1. A method for producing an up-to-date situation depiction, the method comprising:

capturing environment data in a geographic area by at least one of ambient sensors and vehicle sensors of an in-vehicle system,

generating, by a processor of the in-vehicle system, a probability associated with the environment data, and storing the probability in a digital memory of the in-vehicle system,

reading, by the processor of the in-vehicle system, map data from the digital memory of the in-vehicle system,

determining, by the processor of the in-vehicle system, a position of the vehicle by a global satellite position system of the in-vehicle system,

wirelessly transmitting the environment data with the associated probability, by a vehicle-to-X communication device of the in-vehicle system to a stationary database arranged in proximity to the geographic area,

comparing, by a processor of the stationary database, the environment data and associated probability with other environment data and other associated probability of the geographical area that is already existent in a memory of the stationary database, to determine when the environment data and the associated probability differ from the other environment data and the other associated probability that is already existent in a memory of the stationary database,

continually merging, by the processor of the stationary database, environment data and the associated probability with the other environment data and the other associated probability when they differ, to form an up-to-date situation depiction of the geographic area,

transmitting, by a vehicle-to-X communication device of the stationary database to the in-vehicle system, the up-to-date situation depiction of the geographic area, and

controlling recognition, by the processor of the in-vehicle system, of the environment data based on the received probabilities.

2. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein

the database sends the up-to-date situation depiction to the vehicles covered by the locally bounded situation and the up-to-date situation depiction is made available to at least one driver assistance system by the vehicles.

3. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein

objects and events in the up-to-date situation depiction are provided with probabilities of existence by the database.

4. The method as claimed in claim 3, wherein

the probabilities of existence of the objects are additionally individually evaluated by a receiving vehicle.

5. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein

at least one of the environment data, the map data and the position data are sent to the database by the multiplicity of vehicles with comparatively low transmission priority.

6. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein

the multiplicity of vehicles send to the database at least one of only such environment data, map data and position data as are different than the up-to-date situation depiction sent by the database.

7. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein

the position data sent by the multiplicity of vehicles comprise a piece of identification information for the satellites used for determining the position data.

8. A system for producing an up-to-date situation depiction, the system comprising:

a multiplicity of vehicles, each vehicle having at least one of a processor, a digital memory, ambient sensors, vehicle sensors, a global satellite positioning system and a vehicle-to-X communication device in an in-vehicle system,

a stationary database of a stationary device arranged in proximity to a geographic area, that wirelessly receives at least one of an environment data, a map data and a position data wirelessly transmitted from the vehicle-to-X communication device of the in-vehicle system,

wherein the multiplicity of vehicles capture the environment data in the geographic area by at least one of the ambient sensors and the vehicle sensors of the in-vehicle system, generate a probability associated with the environment data, transmit the environment data and the associated probability to the stationary database, and read the map data from the respective one digital memory of the in-vehicle system, and

wherein the stationary database includes a processor configured to;

compare the environment data and associated probability with other environment data and other associated probability of the geographic area that is already existent in the stationary database, to determine when the environment data and the associated probability differ from the other environment data and the other associated probability that is already existent in the stationary database,

continually merge the environment data and the associated probability with the other environment data and the other associated probability when they differ, to form an up-to-date situation depiction of the geographic area,

transmit the up-to-date situation depiction of the geographic area to the in-vehicle system, and

wherein the in-vehicle system controls recognition of environment data based on the received probabilities.

9. The system as claimed in claim 8, wherein

the database is arranged locally at a location that the situation depiction covers.

10. The system as claimed in claim 8, wherein

the ambient sensors are one or more elements selected from the group consisting of

radar sensor,

optical camera sensor,

lidar sensor,

laser sensor,

ultrasonic sensor,

ESP sensor,

ABS sensor and

inclination sensor

and the vehicle-to-X communication device at least one of send and receive at least one of environment data, the map data and the position data on the basis of one or more connection classes is selected from the group consisting of

WLAN connection, particularly based on IEEE 802.11,

ISM (Industrial, Scientific, Medical band) connection,

Bluetooth®

connection,

ZigBee connection

UWB (ultra wide band) connection,

WiMax®

(Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access) connection,

infrared connection and

mobile radio connection.

11. The system as claimed in claim 8, wherein

the system carries out a method in which at least one of environment data, map data and position data describing a locally bounded situation are sent to a database by a multiplicity of vehicles by vehicle-to-X communication device,

wherein the environment data are captured by at least one of ambient sensors and vehicle sensors,

wherein the map data are read from a digital memory and wherein the position data are determined at least by a global satellite position system, wherein at least one of the environment data, the map data and the position data are continually merged with a situation depiction that is already existent in the database to form an up-to-date situation depiction and both the database and the situation depiction are in a fixed location.

12. A method for producing an up-to-date situation depiction, the method comprising:

capturing environment data describing a geographic area by at least one of ambient sensors and vehicle sensors of an in-vehicle system,

generating, by a processor of the in-vehicle system, a probability associated with the environment data, and storing the probability in a digital memory of the in-vehicle system,

wirelessly transmitting, by the in-vehicle system, the environment data and an associated probability to a stationary database arranged in proximity to the geographic area;

comparing, by a processor of the stationary database, the environment data and associated probability with other environment data and other associated probability of the geographical area that is already existent in a memory of the stationary database, to determine when the environment data and the associated probability differ from the other environment data and the other associated probability that is already existent in a memory of the stationary database,

continually merging, by the processor of the stationary database, environment data and the associated probability with the other environment data and the other associated probability when they differ to form an up-to-date situation depiction of the geographic area;

wherein the associated probabilities are probabilities of existence of objects and events in the environment data determined from a proportion of at least one of the ambient sensors and the vehicle sensors sensing the objects and events with respect to a proportion of at least one of the ambient sensors and the vehicle sensors not sensing the objects and events,

wherein a number of at least one of the ambient sensors and the vehicle sensors not configured to sense the objects and events are ignored in determining the probabilities.