AUTONOMOUS VEHICLE COMMUNICATION CONFIGURATION SYSTEM

• US 20170277186A1
• Filed: 06/08/2017
• Published: 09/28/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 12/08/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Uatc, LLC (Uber Technologies, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Uber Technologies, Inc.
• Inventors: Ross, William, Aitken, Michael
• Granted Patent: US 10,234,863 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/362 received from an external device or application, e.g. PDA, mobile phone or calendar application
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0088 characterized by the autonomous decision making process, e.g. artificial intelligence, predefined behaviours using knowledge based models G06N5/00
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/024 in combination with a laser lasers per se H01S
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0274 using mapping information stored in a memory device navigation using map-matching G01C21/30
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0291 Fleet control monitoring fleets in traffic control systems for road vehicles G08G1/127, G08G1/127
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0297 by controlling means in a control room
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/00 Registering or indicating the working of vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/202 Dispatching vehicles on the basis of a location, e.g. taxi dispatching
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/205 Indicating the location of the monitored vehicles as destination, e.g. accidents, stolen, rental
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/318 Received signal strength
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/18504 Aircraft used as relay or high altitude atmospheric platform
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/025 using location based information parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/026 using orientation information, e.g. compass
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/027 using movement velocity, acceleration information
• 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 48/20 Selecting an access point
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/1263 Mapping of traffic onto schedule, e.g. scheduled allocation or multiplexing of flows
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/51 based on terminal or device properties
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/005 : Moving wireless networks

Abstract

An autonomous vehicle (AV) can include a communication system to communicate with a backend system, a sensor system to collect sensor data representing an operational environment of the AV, and a control system that can processes the sensor data to perform a localization operation to determine a location and an orientation of the AV within a given region, and autonomously operate the AV'"'"'s acceleration, braking, and steering systems throughout the given region. Based on the localization operation, the AV can implement a set of configuration commands to configure the communication system to transmit and receive data with the backend system using one or more specified network nodes.

Claims

1. An autonomous vehicle (AV) comprising:

a communication system to communicate with a backend system;

a sensor system to collect sensor data representing an operational environment of the AV;

acceleration, braking, and steering systems; and

a control system to execute an instruction set, causing the control system to;

process the sensor data to (i) perform a localization operation to determine a location and an orientation of the AV within a given region, and (ii) autonomously operate the acceleration, braking, and steering systems throughout the given region; and

based on the localization operation, implement a set of configuration commands to configure the communication system to transmit and receive data with the backend system using one or more specified network nodes.

2. The AV of claim 1, wherein the executed instruction set further causes the control system to:

access a network resource map to determine the one or more specified network nodes based on the location and the orientation of the AV within the given region, the network resource map indicating network sources throughout the given region.

3. The AV of claim 2, wherein the network resource map is stored locally in a memory resource of the AV.

4. The AV of claim 2, wherein the network resource map is stored remotely and is accessible by the AV via one or more networks.

5. The AV of claim 1, wherein the executed instruction set further causes the control system to:

perform one or more ray tracing operations to identify the one or more specified network nodes; and

generate the set of configuration commands based on the one or more ray tracing operations.

6. The AV of claim 1, wherein the executed instruction set further causes the control system to:

transmit localization data, corresponding to the location and the orientation of the AV, to the backend system; and

receive the set of configuration commands from the backend system;

wherein the backend system utilizes the localization data to determine the set of configuration commands for the AV based on a network resource map indicating network sources throughout the given region.

7. The AV of claim 6, wherein the executed instruction set causes the control system to dynamically perform the localization operation, transmit the localization data to the backend system, receive respective sets of configuration commands from the backend system, and implement the respective sets of configuration commands to configure the communication system as the AV travels throughout the given region.

8. The AV of claim 6, wherein the executed instruction set causes the AV control system to periodically perform the localization operation, transmit the localization data to the backend system, receive respective sets of configuration commands from the backend system, and implement the respective sets of configuration commands to configure the communication system as the AV travels throughout the given region.

9. The AV of claim 1, wherein the executed instructions set causes the control system to implement the set of configuration commands to configure the communication system by beam steering a radiation pattern of the communication system, while operating the acceleration, braking, and steering system throughout the given region, to communicate with the backend system via the one or more specified network nodes.

10. The AV of claim 1, wherein the network nodes correspond to one or more of a 900 MHz unlicensed, a 3G, a 4G, a 4G LTE, a WiFi, a WiMax, a WiGig, or a dedicated short-range communications protocol.

11. A communication system for an autonomous vehicle (AV) comprising:

a communication array;

one or more processors; and

one or more memory resources storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the communication system to;

determine a location and an orientation of the AV within a given region; and

based on the location and the orientation, implement a set of configuration commands to configure the communication array to transmit and receive data with backend system using one or more specified network nodes.

12. The communication system of claim 11, wherein the executed instructions further cause the communication system to:

access a network resource map to determine the one or more specified network nodes based on the location and the orientation of the AV within the given region, the network resource map indicating network sources throughout the given region.

13. The communication system of claim 12, wherein the network resource map is stored locally in a memory resource of the AV.

14. The communication system of claim 12, wherein the network resource map is stored remotely and is accessible by the AV via the one or more networks.

15. The communication system of claim 11, wherein the executed instructions further cause the communication system to:

perform one or more ray tracing operations to identify the one or more specified network nodes; and

generate the set of configuration commands based on the one or more ray tracing operations.

16. The communication system of claim 11, wherein the executed instructions further cause the communication system to:

transmit localization data, corresponding to the location and the orientation of the AV, to the backend system over one or more networks; and

receive the set of configuration commands from the backend system;

wherein the backend system utilizes the localization data to determine the set of configuration commands for the AV based on a network resource map indicating network sources throughout the given region.

17. The communication system of claim 11, wherein the executed instructions cause the communication system to implement the set of configuration commands by beam steering a radiation pattern of the communication array to communicate with the backend system via the one or more specified network nodes.

18. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to:

determine a location and an orientation of the AV within a given region; and

based on the location and the orientation, implement a set of configuration commands to configure the communication array to transmit and receive data with backend system using one or more specified network nodes.

19. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the executed instructions further cause the one or more processors to:

access a network resource map to determine the one or more specified network nodes based on the location and the orientation of the AV within the given region, the network resource map indicating network sources throughout the given region.

20. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the executed instructions further cause the one or more processors to:

perform one or more ray tracing operations to identify the one or more specified network nodes; and

generate the set of configuration commands based on the one or more ray tracing operations.