Communication method and arrangement

• US 20050137786A1
• Filed: 01/03/2005
• Published: 06/23/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 10/22/1997
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: American Vehicular Sciences LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Intelligent Technologies International, Inc.
• Inventors: Breed, David S., Johnson, Wendell C., DuVall, Wilbur E., Lukin, Kostyantyn Alexandrovich, Konovalov, Vladymyr Michailovich
• Granted Patent: US 7,110,880 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/200
• CPC Class Codes: B60N 2/2863 backward facing
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 10/06 including control of combustion engines
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 10/18 including control of braking systems
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 10/20 including control of steering systems
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2050/0071 Controller overrides driver automatically
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2050/0073 Driver overrides controller
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2050/0075 Automatic parameter input, automatic initialising or calibrating means
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2556/50 of positioning data, e.g. GPS [Global Positioning System] data
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/02 Control of vehicle driving stability
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/04 related to roll-over prevention
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/14 Adaptive cruise control
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/16 Control of distance between vehicles, e.g. keeping a distance to preceding vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/18154 Approaching an intersection
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/18159 Traversing an intersection
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/18172 Preventing, or responsive to skidding of wheels
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 40/06 Road conditions
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 40/072 Curvature of the road
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 40/076 Slope angle of the road
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/00 Details of control systems for road vehicle drive control not related to the control of a particular sub-unit , e.g. process diagnostic or vehicle driver interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/14 Means for informing the driver, warning the driver or prompting a driver intervention
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 13/931 : of land vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 17/86 : Combinations of lidar systems with systems other than lidar, radar or sonar, e.g. with direction finders
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 17/89 : for mapping or imaging
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/17 : Emergency applications
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/41 : Differential correction, e.g. DGPS [differential GPS]
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/42 : Determining position
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/50 : whereby the position solution is constrained to lie upon a particular curve or surface, e.g. for locomotives on railway tracks
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/9315 : Monitoring blind spots
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/9316 : combined with communication equipment with other vehicles or with base stations
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/9318 : Controlling the steering
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/93185 : Controlling the brakes
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/9319 : Controlling the accelerator
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/932 : using own vehicle data, e.g. ground speed, steering wheel direction
• 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 2013/93271 : in the front of the vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/93272 : in the back of the vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/93273 : on the top of the vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2013/9329 : cooperating with reflectors or transponders
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0225 : involving docking at a fixed facility, e.g. base station or loading bay parking aids B62D15/027
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0246 : using a video camera in combination with image processing means
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0257 : using a radar radar systems designed for anti-collision purposes between land vehicles or between land vehicle and fixed obstacles G01S13/931
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/027 : comprising intertial navigation means, e.g. azimuth detector inertial navigation G01C21/16; inertial navigation combined with non-inertial navigation instruments G01C21/165
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0274 : using mapping information stored in a memory device navigation using map-matching G01C21/30
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0278 : using satellite positioning signals, e.g. GPS
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/161 : Decentralised systems, e.g. inter-vehicle communication
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/163 : involving continuous checking
• 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
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/166 : for active traffic, e.g. moving vehicles, pedestrians, bikes
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/167 : Driving aids for lane monitoring, lane changing, e.g. blind spot detection

Abstract

Arrangement for transferring information between a vehicle and one or more transmitters separate from the vehicle includes an antenna mounted on the vehicle and capable of receiving radio frequency waves emitted by the transmitter and containing information, a position determining device for determining the position of the vehicle, and a processor coupled to the antenna and the position determining device and arranged to analyze the waves received by the antenna, determine whether any received waves contain information of interest for operation of the vehicle based on the vehicle'"'"'s position as determined by the position determining device, and extract the information of interest only from the received waves determined to contain information of interest. The information of interest may be information about the transmitter such as its location, speed, velocity, etc., or information relating to road conditions, weather and the like.

Claims

1. An arrangement for transferring information between a vehicle and at least one transmitter separate from the vehicle, comprising:

an antenna mounted on the vehicle and capable of receiving radio frequency waves emitted by the transmitter and containing information;

a position determining device for determining the position of the vehicle; and

a processor coupled to said antenna and said position determining device and arranged to analyze the waves received by said antenna, determine whether any received waves contain information of interest for operation of the vehicle based on the vehicle'"'"'s position as determined by said position determining device, and extract the information of interest only from the received waves determined to contain information of interest.

2. The arrangement of claim 1, wherein each of the at least one transmitter transmits radio frequency waves containing positional information about the transmitter, information necessitated by the information transferring arrangement and additional information of potential interest for operation of the vehicle, said processor being arranged to extract only the positional information and the information necessitated by the information transferring arrangement from all received waves and additional information only from received waves determined to contain information of interest for operation of the vehicle.

3. The arrangement of claim 2, wherein the information of interest is a distance between the transmitter and the vehicle, an angle between the transmitter and the vehicle, a direction between the transmitter and the vehicle, a place of the transmitter and a geographic position of the transmitter and combinations thereof.

4. The arrangement of claim 2, wherein said processor is arranged to analyze the positional information extracted from all of the received waves to determine whether any received waves originate from a transmitter within a pre-determined area relative to the vehicle whereby received waves from any transmitter determined to be within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle are considered to contain information of interest for operation of the vehicle.

5. The arrangement of claim 1, wherein said processor is arranged to direct the transmission of encoded signals from said antenna including information about the position of the vehicle.

6. The arrangement of claim 5, wherein said processor is arranged to derive encoded signals using a code based on the position of the vehicle.

7. The arrangement of claim 1, wherein said processor is arranged to direct the transmission of encoded signals from said antenna including information about the position of the vehicle and identification of the vehicle.

8. The arrangement of claim 1, further comprising a speed determining device arranged in the vehicle for determining the speed of the vehicle, said processor being coupled to said speed determining device for encoding signals including information about the speed of the vehicle.

9. The arrangement of claim 1, further comprising a motion determining device arranged in the vehicle for determining the direction of motion of the vehicle, said processor being coupled to said speed determining device for encoding signals including information about the direction of motion of the vehicle.

10. The arrangement of claim 1, wherein said processor is arranged to derive encoded signals by phase modulation of distance or time between code transmissions, phase or amplitude modulation of the code sequences, changes of the polarity of the entire code sequence or the individual code segments, or bandwidth modulation of the code sequence, said processor deriving the encoded signals using a code based on the position of the vehicle.

11. A method for transferring information between a vehicle and at least one transmitter separate from the vehicle, each transmitter transmitting radio frequency waves containing positional information about the transmitter, information necessitated by the information transferring method and additional information of potential interest for operation of the vehicle, comprising:

arranging an antenna on the vehicle capable of receiving the radio frequency waves emitted by the transmitter;

receiving waves transmitted by the at least one transmitter via the antenna;

determining the position of the vehicle;

analyzing the waves received by the antenna to extract the positional information about the transmitter and information necessitated by the information transferring method from each wave;

determining from the extracted positional information whether any transmitted waves contain additional information of actual interest for operation of the vehicle; and

extracting the additional information only from those transmitted signals determined to contain information of actual interest for operation of the vehicle.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the additional information contained in each transmitted wave is a distance between the transmitter and the vehicle, an angle between the transmitter and the vehicle, a direction between the transmitter and the vehicle, a place of the transmitter and a geographic position of the transmitter and combinations thereof.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein the wave analysis step comprises analyzing the received waves to determine whether any received waves originate from a transmitter within a pre-determined area relative to the vehicle, the information extracting step comprising extracting additional information only from the waves received from any transmitter determined to be within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

determining a direction between each transmitter within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle and the vehicle; and

limiting the extraction of additional information from waves received from the transmitters within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle to only those whose direction to the vehicle affects the traveling of the vehicle.

15. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

determining a direction of travel of each transmitter within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle and the vehicle; and

limiting the extraction of additional information from waves received from the transmitters within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle to only those whose direction of travel affects the traveling of the vehicle.

16. The method of claim 11, wherein the wave analysis step comprises analyzing the received waves to determine whether any received waves originate from a transmitter traveling in a direction toward the vehicle'"'"'s current position, the information extracting step comprising extracting additional information only from the waves received from any transmitter traveling toward the vehicle'"'"'s current position.

17. The method of claim 11, wherein the wave analysis step comprises analyzing the received waves to determine whether any received waves originate from a transmitter traveling in a direction toward the vehicle'"'"'s current position or toward the vehicle'"'"'s projected position based on the vehicle'"'"'s current position and direction of travel, the information extracting step comprising extracting additional information only from the waves received from any transmitter traveling in a direction toward the vehicle'"'"'s current or projected position.

18. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

transmitting encoded signals from the antenna including information about the position of the vehicle; and

selecting a code to use for encoding the signal based on the position of the vehicle.

19. The method of claim 11, wherein the signals are analyzed to determine whether any of the signals originate from transmitters dedicated to the transmission of road conditions or traffic data whereby the signals containing information of interest originate from the transmitters dedicated to the transmission of road conditions or traffic data.

20. A method for transferring information from transmitters to a moving vehicle, comprising:

determining the position of the vehicle;

transmitting a signal from each transmitter containing its position, information necessitated by the information transferring method and additional information;

arranging an antenna on the vehicle;

receiving the signals from the transmitters via the antenna;

analyzing the signals received by the antenna to extract the positional information about the transmitters and information necessitated by the information transferring method from each signal;

determining whether any transmitters are situated within a pre-determined area relative to the vehicle; and

extracting the additional information only from signals received from transmitters within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle.

21. The method of claim 20, further comprising defining the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle to include a distance between the transmitter and the vehicle, an angle between the transmitter and the vehicle, a direction between the transmitter and the vehicle, a place of the transmitter and a geographic position of the transmitter and combinations thereof.

22. The method of claim 20, further comprising:

determining a direction between each transmitter within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle and the vehicle; and

limiting the extraction of the additional information from waves received from the transmitters within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle to only those whose direction affects the traveling of the vehicle.

23. The method of claim 22, further comprising:

determining a direction of travel of each transmitter within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle and the vehicle; and

limiting the extraction of additional information from waves received from the transmitters within the pre-determined area relative to the vehicle to only those whose direction of travel affects the traveling of the vehicle.

24. The method of claim 20, further comprising:

determining whether any received waves originate from a transmitter traveling in a direction toward the vehicle'"'"'s current position; and

extracting additional information only from the waves received from any transmitter traveling toward the vehicle'"'"'s current position.

25. The method of claim 20, further comprising:

determining whether any received waves originate from a transmitter traveling in a direction toward the vehicle'"'"'s current position or toward the vehicle'"'"'s projected position based on the vehicle'"'"'s current position and direction of travel; and

extracting additional information only from the waves received from any transmitter traveling in a direction toward the vehicle'"'"'s current or projected position.

26. The method of claim 20, further comprising:

encoding the signals transmitted by the transmitters; and

selecting a code to use for encoding the signals for each transmitter based on the position of the transmitter.

27. The method of claim 20, further comprising:

positioning the transmitters on vehicles; and

determining the position of each transmitter using a GPS-based system.

28. A method for avoiding collisions between moving vehicles, comprising:

determining the position of each vehicle

equipping each vehicle with a transmitter/receiver;

transmitting a signal from each transmitter/receiver containing its position and additional information;

receiving the signals at each transmitter/receiver from the other transmitter/receivers;

analyzing the signals at each transmitter/receiver to extract the positional information about the vehicles equipped with the other transmitter/receivers from each signal in order to determine whether any vehicles are situated within a pre-determined area relative to that transmitter/receiver; and

if so,

extracting the additional information only from signals received from other transmitter/receivers in the vehicles within the pre-determined area relative to that transmitter/receiver, and

analyzing the additional information to ascertain whether a collision with the vehicles equipped with the other transmitter/receivers is likely to occur in order to enable evasive action to be taken to prevent the collision.

29. The method of claim 28, further comprising:

determining a direction between each of the vehicle equipped with the other transmitter/receivers within the pre-determined distance from that transmitter/receiver; and

limiting the extraction of the additional information only those whose direction affects the traveling of the vehicle.

30. The method of claim 28, further comprising:

encoding the signals transmitted by the transmitter/receivers; and

selecting a code to use for encoding the signals for each transmitter/receiver based on the position of the transmitter/receiver.

31. The method of claim 28, further comprising determining the position of each transmitter/receiver using a GPS-based system.

32. A method for transferring information between a vehicle and at least one transmitter separate from the vehicle, comprising:

mounting an antenna on the vehicle which is capable of receiving radio frequency waves emitted by the transmitter containing information;

determining the position of the vehicle;

analyzing the waves received by the antenna;

determining whether any received waves contain information of interest for operation of the vehicle based on the vehicle'"'"'s position; and

extracting the information of interest only from the received waves determined to contain information of interest.