In-depth understanding of lane changing interactions for in-vehicle driving assistance systems

Lane-changing events are often related with safety concern and traffic operational efficiency due to complex interactions with neighboring vehicles. In particular, lane changes in stop-and-go traffic conditions are of keen interest because these events lead to higher risk of crash occurrence caused by more frequent and abrupt vehicle acceleration and deceleration. From these perspectives, in-depth understanding of lane changes would be of keen interest in developing in-vehicle driving assistance systems. The purpose of this study is to analyze vehicle interactions using vehicle trajectories and to identify factors affecting lane changes with stop-and-go traffic conditions. This study used vehicle trajectory data obtained from a segment of the US-101 freeway in Southern California, as a part of the Next Generation Simulation (NGSIM) project. Vehicle trajectories were divided into two groups; with stop-and-go and without stop-and-go traffic conditions. Binary logistic regression (BLR), a well-known technique for dealing with the binary choice condition, was adopted to establish lane-changing decision models. Regarding lane changes without stop-and-go traffic conditions, it was identified based on the odd ratio investigation that he subject vehicle driver is more likely to pay attention to the movement of vehicles ahead, regardless of vehicle positions such as current and target lanes. On the other hand, the subject vehicle driver in stop-and-go traffic conditions is more likely to be affected by vehicles traveling on the target lane when deciding lane changes. The two BLR models are adequate for lane-changing decisions in normal and stop-and-go traffic conditions with about 80 % accuracy. A possible reason for this finding is that the subject vehicle driver has a tendency to pay greater attention to avoiding sideswipe or rear-end collision with vehicles on the target lane. These findings are expected to be used for better understanding of driver’s lane changing behavior associated with congested stop-and-go traffic conditions, and give valuable insights in developing algorithms to process sensor data in designing safer lateral maneuvering assistance systems, which include, for example, blind spot detection systems (BSDS) and lane keeping assistance systems (LKAS).     

Role of steering wheel feedback on driver performance: driving simulator and modeling analysis

When driving in curves, how do drivers use the force appearing on the steering wheel? As it carries information related to lateral acceleration, this force could be necessary for drivers to tune their internal model of vehicle dynamics; alternatively, being opposed to the drivers' efforts, it could just help them stabilize the steering wheel position. To assess these two hypotheses, we designed an experiment on a motion-based driving simulator. The steering characteristics of the vehicle were modified in the course of driving, unknown to drivers. Results obtained with standard drivers showed a surprisingly wide range of adaptation, except for exaggerated modifications of the steering force feedback. A two-level driver model, combining a preview of vehicle dynamics and a neuromuscular steering control, reproduces these experimental results qualitatively and indicates that adaptation occurs at the haptic level rather than in the internal model of vehicle dynamics. This effect is related to other theories on the manual control of dynamics systems, wherein force feedback characteristics are abstracted at the position control level. This research also illustrates the use of driving simulation for the study of driver behavior and future intelligent steering assistance systems.     

Role of steering wheel feedback on driver performance: driving simulator and modeling analysis

When driving in curves, how do drivers use the force appearing on the steering wheel? As it carries information related to lateral acceleration, this force could be necessary for drivers to tune their internal model of vehicle dynamics; alternatively, being opposed to the drivers' efforts, it could just help them stabilize the steering wheel position. To assess these two hypotheses, we designed an experiment on a motion-based driving simulator. The steering characteristics of the vehicle were modified in the course of driving, unknown to drivers. Results obtained with standard drivers showed a surprisingly wide range of adaptation, except for exaggerated modifications of the steering force feedback. A two-level driver model, combining a preview of vehicle dynamics and a neuromuscular steering control, reproduces these experimental results qualitatively and indicates that adaptation occurs at the haptic level rather than in the internal model of vehicle dynamics. This effect is related to other theories on the manual control of dynamics systems, wherein force feedback characteristics are abstracted at the position control level. This research also illustrates the use of driving simulation for the study of driver behavior and future intelligent steering assistance systems.     

In and out vision-based driver-interactive assistance system

The overall driving environment consists of the Traffic environment, vehicle and driver states (TVD). advanced driver assistance Systems (ADAS) must consider not only information on each of the TVD states but also their context. Recent research has focused on making more efficient and effective assistance systems by fusing all the information from the TVD states. Based on this research trend, this paper focuses on decision-level fusion to estimate the level of danger of a warning by using visual information of the traffic environment and the driver state. The driver state consists of the gazing region and the facial feature points that are obtained using the active appearance model (AAM). The traffic environment state consists of time to collision (TTC), time to lane Crossing (TLC), and lane color information, which are obtained from the environment in front of the vehicle, i.e., position of lanes and other vehicles. Warnings against lane-off, collision, and driver inattention are generated by fusing this vision-based information from inside and outside the vehicle. The experimental results prove that our vision-based interactive driver assistance system reduces most useless warnings.     

Novel stability control strategy for distributed drive electric vehicle based on driver operation intention

In this paper, a novel direct yaw control method based on driver operation intention for stability control of a distributed drive electric vehicle is proposed. It was discovered that the vehicle loses its stability easily under an emergency steering alignment (EA) problem. An emergent control algorithm is proposed to improve vehicle stability under such a condition. A driver operation intention recognition module is developed to identify the driving conditions. When the vehicle enters into an EA condition, the module can quickly identify it and transfer the control method from normal direct yaw control to emergency control. Two control algorithms are designed. The emergency control algorithm is applied to an EA condition while the adaptive control algorithm is applied to other conditions except the EA condition. Both simulation results and real vehicle results show that: The driver module can accurately identify driving conditions based on driver operation intention. When the vehicle enters into EA condition, the emergent control algorithm can intervene quickly, and it has proven to outperform normal direct yaw control for better stabilization of vehicles.     

驾驶模拟器在自动驾驶系统中的应用研究

自动驾驶车辆在实际道路上行驶之前的测试阶段是一个至关重要的环节。一个低成本、高效率以及高精度测量的自动驾驶车辆的测试方式,对于自动驾驶车辆的开发具有重要意义。将驾驶模拟器运用到研究自动驾驶车辆测试已是近年来的一个研究热点。基于虚拟驾驶场景的自动驾驶车辆的检测,通过组合虚拟驾驶场景的背景车辆、行人、交通灯、建筑、指示标牌等元素,研究将驾驶模拟器与虚拟驾驶场景的联合应用来测试自动驾驶车辆。设计了典型的交通场景,通过自动驾驶车辆和背景车辆的实时交互,研究自动驾驶车辆的各项性能指标。研究结果表明:该驾驶模拟器可以高度拟合人类驾驶体验,驾驶员通过驾驶模拟器控制背景车辆能够很好的模拟现实中的驾驶行为,对自动驾驶车辆的仿真测试起到了促进作用。     

Comparison of driving characteristics between drivers in Korea and in the united states of America based on driver-vehicle interaction field database

Research and development involving intelligent vehicles of today is geared to safe, driver-friendly and sensitive vehicles that provide a driver with a pleasant and convenient driving environment while preventing him or her from possible risks of accident. In developing convenient and safe vehicles, research on drivers’ driving patterns, reactions and state characteristics depending on road conditions in actual field is essential in order to devise more driver-friendly intelligent vehicles. This paper describes how a driver-vehicle interaction (DVI) field database is built in order to obtain a driver’s input in normal road driving condition on highways, country roads, and city roads, and his or her state information, as well as data on the vehicle and traffic conditions. And the newly built database is compared with the RDCW FOT database established by UMTRI of the US for analysis to suggest that the driving tendencies of drivers in Korea and the road driving conditions are not the same as those in the US, reconfirming the need to establish a DVI field database, which will be used for the development of intelligent vehicles suitable for the Korean environment. The DVI data collected from actual driving in field are anticipated to be widely utilized as basic data for research on various intelligent driving safety systems, advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and human-vehicle interface (HVI) that are suitable for the driving environment in Korea.     

Real-time characterisation of driver steering behaviour

In recent years the application of driver steering models has extended from the off-line simulation environment to autonomous vehicles research and the support of driver assistance systems. For these new environments there is a need for the model to be adaptive in real time, so the supporting vehicle systems can react to changes in the driver, their driving style, mood and skill. This paper provides a novel means to meet these needs by combining a simple driver model with a single-track vehicle handling model in a parameter estimating filter – in this case, an unscented Kalman filter. Although the steering model is simple, a motion simulator study shows it is capable of characterising a range of driving styles and may also indicate the level of skill of the driver. The resulting filter is also efficient – comfortably operating faster than real time – and it requires only steer and speed measurements from the vehicle in addition to the reference path. Adaptation of the steer model parameters is demonstrated along with robustness of the filter to errors in initial conditions, using data from five test drivers in vehicle tests carried out on the open road.

Abbreviations: ADAS: advanced driver assistance systems; CG: centre of gravity; CAN: controller area network; EKF: extended Kalman filter; GPS: global positioning system; UKF: unscented Kalman filter     

Vision-based fusion of robust lane tracking and forward vehicle detection in a real driving environment

With the goal of developing an accurate and fast lane tracking system for the purpose of driver assistance, this paper proposes a vision-based fusion technique for lane tracking and forward vehicle detection to handle challenging conditions, i.e., lane occlusion by a forward vehicle, lane change, varying illumination, road traffic signs, and pitch motion, all of which often occur in real driving environments. First, our algorithm uses random sample consensus (RANSAC) and Kalman filtering to calculate the lane equation from the lane candidates found by template matching. Simple template matching and a combination of RANSAC and Kalman filtering makes calculating the lane equation as a hyperbola pair very quick and robust against varying illumination and discontinuities in the lane. Second, our algorithm uses a state transfer technique to maintain lane tracking continuously in spite of the lane changing situation. This reduces the computational time when dealing with the lane change because lane detection, which takes much more time than lane tracking, is not necessary with this algorithm. Third, false lane candidates from occlusions by frontal vehicles are eliminated using accurate regions of the forward vehicles from our improved forward vehicle detector. Fourth, our proposed method achieved robustness against road traffic signs and pitch motion using the adaptive region of interest and a constraint on the position of the vanishing point. Our algorithm was tested with image sequences from a real driving situation and demonstrated its robustness.     

商用车电液复合转向系统的车道保持策略

为了提高商用车的行驶安全性,避免因驾驶人的分心驾驶出现车辆偏离车道的问题,提出一种基于电液复合转向系统的商用车车道保持策略;在建立电液复合转向系统模型、二自由度车辆模型、预瞄驾驶人模型的基础上,设计基于驾驶人在环的MPC和ADRC串级的车道保持控制策略。首先,采用MPC算法将车辆横向位置控制的最优问题转化为二次规划求得目标前轮转角;然后,考虑电液复合转向系统的不确定和干扰问题,利用ADRC算法对目标转向盘转角和实际驾驶人的转向盘转角差值以转矩信号的形式进行补偿。同时研究车道保持系统对驾驶人的干预问题,引入干预系数的概念,采用模糊控制的方法,将驾驶人手力和车辆的运动状态作为输入变量,干预系数作为输出变量,保证整车行驶安全性的前提下减小车道保持辅助系统对驾驶人的干预。最后,通过MATLAB/Simulink仿真和硬件在环试验对所设计的控制策略进行验证。研究结果表明：所设计的基于商用车电液复合转向系统的车道保持策略能够及时地纠正因驾驶人的分心驾驶而导致车辆偏离所在行驶车道的行为,特别是在弯道处出现驾驶人转向不足或过度转向的情况时,能够将车辆维持在车道线之内,保证车辆的行驶安全性,同时由于干预系数的设计,使得驾驶人也有良好的人机交互体验感。     

IntelliWay-变耦合模块化智慧高速公路系统一体化架构及测评体系

根据当前智慧高速公路系统的发展历程,总结一些典型的车路协同系统逻辑与物理模型。在总结国内外智慧高速公路系统的整体架构之后,提出新一代智慧高速系统的总体架构-IntelliWay,包括智慧高速公路系统分层模块化架构、基于变耦合程度的智能分级和基于事件驱动的数据分发机制。同时,根据当前智慧高速公路系统的主流应用技术,总结车载高精度定位、高级驾驶辅助系统(Advanced Driver Assistance System, ADAS)与车载总线、路侧设备优化、异构网络融合、网络负载均衡、网络信息安全、多传感器融合与协同感知、以用户为中心的场景自适应信息发布、车辆群体协同自动驾驶、基于大数据与人工智能的交通态势预测、车道级主动交通管理、组件式应用服务开发等驱动智慧高速公路系统快速发展的新兴技术研究现状,然后基于以上关键技术的特点提出未来智慧高速公路系统应用的实施建议;分析广播式交通信息服务、主动交通管理、伴随式信息服务、自动驾驶专用道、车辆队列协同驾驶等智慧高速公路系统的典型应用场景,进行智慧高速系统的测评方法分析和相关案例分析。最后,系统性地分析和预测智慧高速系统存在的挑战及未来发展趋势,以...     

Risk management algorithm for rear-side collision avoidance using a combined steering torque overlay and differential braking

This paper describes a risk management algorithm for rear-side collision avoidance. The proposed risk management algorithm consists of a supervisor and a coordinator. The supervisor is designed to monitor collision risks between the subject vehicle and approaching vehicle in the adjacent lane. An appropriate criterion of intervention, which satisfies high acceptance to drivers through the consideration of a realistic traffic, has been determined based on the analysis of the kinematics of the vehicles in longitudinal and lateral directions. In order to assist the driver actively and increase driver's safety, a coordinator is designed to combine lateral control using a steering torque overlay by motor-driven power steering and differential braking by vehicle stability control. In order to prevent the collision while limiting actuator's control inputs and vehicle dynamics to safe values for the assurance of the driver's comfort, the Lyapunov theory and linear matrix inequalities based optimisation methods have been used. The proposed risk management algorithm has been evaluated via simulation using CarSim and MATLAB/Simulink.     

A driver-adaptive stability control strategy for sport utility vehicles

Conventional vehicle stability control (VSC) systems are designed for average drivers. For a driver with a good driving skill, the VSC systems may be redundant; for a driver with a poor driving skill, the VSC intervention may be inadequate. To increase safety of sport utility vehicles (SUVs), this paper proposes a novel driver-adaptive VSC (DAVSC) strategy based on scaling the target yaw rate commanded by the driver. The DAVSC system is adaptive to drivers’ driving skills. More control effort would be exerted for drivers with poor driving skills, and vice versa. A sliding mode control (SMC)-based differential braking (DB) controller is designed using a three degrees of freedom (DOF) yaw-plane model. An eight DOF nonlinear yaw-roll model is used to simulate the SUV dynamics. Two driver models, namely longitudinal and lateral, are used to ‘drive’ the virtual SUV. By integrating the virtual SUV, the DB controller, and the driver models, the performance of the DAVSC system is investigated. The simulations demonstrate the effectiveness of the DAVSC strategy.     

Evaluation of preview G-Vectoring control to decelerate a vehicle prior to entry into a curve

This paper describes the development of the braking assistance system based on a “G-Vectoring” concept. The present work focuses in particular on “Preview G-Vectoring Control” (PGVC), which is based on the “G-Vectoring Control” (GVC) scheme. In GVC, the longitudinal-acceleration control algorithm is based on the actual lateral jerk. PGVC decelerates a vehicle before it enters a curve, and is based on a new longitudinal-acceleration control algorithm which uses predicted and actual lateral jerk. Using the predicted lateral jerk makes it possible to decelerate the vehicle prior to curve entry. This deceleration can emulate a driver’s deceleration as the vehicle approaches a curve entry. PGVC is based on such deceleration algorithms and enables automatic deceleration similar to the action of a driver. It is thus possible to significantly improve the driver’s feeling when this system is activated. Driving tests with this new control system on snowy-winding course confirmed that the automatic brake control quality improved considerably compared to manual driver control considering both lap time and ride quality. These results indicate that PGVC can be a useful braking assistance system not only to improve the driver’s handling performance but also to reduce the brake-task during driving on winding roads.     

A Fuzzy Logic Direct Yaw-Moment Control System for All-Wheel-Drive Electric Vehicles

Summary In-wheel-motors are revolutionary new electric drive systems that can be housed in vehicle wheel assemblies. Such E-wheels permit packaging flexibility by eliminating the central drive motor and the associated transmission and driveline components, including the transmission, the differential, the universal joints and the drive shaft. Apart from many advantages of such a system, unequalled independent wheel control allows vehicle dynamic improvement to assist the driver in enhancing cornering and straight-line stability on slippery roads and in adverse ground conditions. In this paper a Fuzzy logic driver-assist stability system for all-wheel-drive electric vehicles based on a yaw reference DYC is introduced. The system assists the driver with path correction, thus enhancing cornering and straight-line stability and providing enhanced safety. A feed-forward neural network is employed to generate the required yaw rate reference. The neural net maps the vehicle speed and the steering angle to give the yaw rate reference. The vehicle true speed is estimated using a multi-sensor data fusion method. Data from wheel sensors and an embedded accelerometer are fed into an estimator, where a Fuzzy logic system decides which input is more reliable. The efficiency of the proposed system is approved by conducting a computer simulation. The proposed control system is an effective and easy to implement method to enhance the stability of all-wheel-drive electric vehicles.     

A Fuzzy Logic Direct Yaw-Moment Control System for All-Wheel-Drive Electric Vehicles

Summary In-wheel-motors are revolutionary new electric drive systems that can be housed in vehicle wheel assemblies. Such E-wheels permit packaging flexibility by eliminating the central drive motor and the associated transmission and driveline components, including the transmission, the differential, the universal joints and the drive shaft. Apart from many advantages of such a system, unequalled independent wheel control allows vehicle dynamic improvement to assist the driver in enhancing cornering and straight-line stability on slippery roads and in adverse ground conditions. In this paper a Fuzzy logic driver-assist stability system for all-wheel-drive electric vehicles based on a yaw reference DYC is introduced. The system assists the driver with path correction, thus enhancing cornering and straight-line stability and providing enhanced safety. A feed-forward neural network is employed to generate the required yaw rate reference. The neural net maps the vehicle speed and the steering angle to give the yaw rate reference. The vehicle true speed is estimated using a multi-sensor data fusion method. Data from wheel sensors and an embedded accelerometer are fed into an estimator, where a Fuzzy logic system decides which input is more reliable. The efficiency of the proposed system is approved by conducting a computer simulation. The proposed control system is an effective and easy to implement method to enhance the stability of all-wheel-drive electric vehicles.     

驾驶员稳态预瞄动态校正假说

针对汽车运动学和动力学自身的特点及驾驶员对其的理解和认识，基于预瞄跟随理论和预测控制理论，在驾驶员行为建模中作出了汽车运动学和动力学特性的分隔处理，提出了驾驶员稳态预瞄动态校正假说，并结合仿真计算和驾驶模拟器实验论证了假说的合理性和有效性。     

基于稳定性和宏观交通流模型的车辆路径规划

为了提升车辆的安全性和能量利用率，从路径规划的层面出发，针对避免车辆遇到极端工况及低效率工况的问题，提出将车辆稳定性判据模型和交通流模型相结合的方法来规划车辆路径，使得车辆在路面湿滑情况下实现快速、安全的行驶。使用交通流模型预测车辆未来将要面临的交通环境变化，再使用稳定性判据模型评估未来交通的安全性，以便为混合动力车辆规划出最快且最安全的路径。具体来讲，为了预测混合动力车辆未来将要面临的车速及车流密度的变化，使用通量矢量分裂格式求解广义Aw-Rascle-Zhang（GARZ）宏观交通流模型。此外，使用驾驶人在环仿真平台PreScan，收集了同一驾驶人在不同车速及不同相对前车距离时给出的前轮转向角响应。基于前轮驱动（FWD）前轮转向（FWS）车辆和全轮转向（AWS）分布式驱动车辆（DDV）的Simulink模型，给出了不同前轮转向角对应的轮胎力饱和因子（δ_TFSC）响应。使用人工神经网络训练不同车速和车流密度对应的δ_TFSC，建立了车辆的稳定性判据模型。使用新建立的稳定性判据模型对交通流模型预测的参数（车流速及车流密度）进行稳定性评估。然后，基于以上的方法优化了车辆行驶路径，以确保车辆在湿滑路面上的行驶安全。最后，使用US-101真实交通流数据来验证交通流模型的预测结果。经实例验证得出：交通流模型与车辆横向稳定性判据模型相结合可以从路径规划的层面保证车辆安全行驶并提升交通系统的通行效率。     

面向智能车辆的现役道路设施行驶适应性研究综述

为了总结面向智能车辆的现役道路设施行驶适应性，即现役道路基础设施承载智能车辆行驶的适宜程度，阐述自主智能驾驶定义与驾驶自动化等级分类，在此基础上剖析不同等级间的人机功能差异，并分别从感知层、感知-决策层、决策-控制层探讨与道路设计要素相关联的人机功能差异，通过归纳总结智能车辆与道路几何要素、路面性能及其他道路要素(如道路标线)的相互作用机制研究，从道路工程角度及其他道路要素方面回顾该领域的研究现状，指出存在的问题和未来发展方向。研究结果表明：相比传统车辆，配置高等级自动驾驶系统的智能车辆对现役道路设施行驶适应性最高，主动安全系统次之，而驾驶辅助及有条件自动驾驶系统适应性不足。而目前研究主要问题包括：难以归纳、标定不同驾驶自动化等级间的人机功能差异及其对于道路设计参数的需求设计值；测试道路场景条件过于理想，考虑的驾驶自动化等级单一，试验规模和样本有限；道路几何、路面性能以及道路标志、标线等道路要素与智能车辆间的相互作用机制研究不足，缺乏与不同道路场景相匹配的智能车辆驾驶特征数据的获取手段。因此建议：重视并推动与道路设计要素相关联的关键人机功能差异指标信息共享；联合高保真且可交互的道路场景、高精度感知传感器物理模型、车辆动力学模型及微观交通流模型，利用测试场景自动化生成、极限工况场景搜寻与泛化等技术开展智能驾驶虚拟测试，突破现有研究的深度和广度；探索反映不同等级智能车辆的道路行驶适应性特征指标与评价标准，精准、有效地评估预测复杂道路场景及不利道路条件下的行驶适应性。     

Proper PD steering assistance constant based on the driving situation

Proportional derivative (PD) steering assistance can greatly improve the control stability of a vehicle. However, for all PD steering methods, the discomfort associated with the need to continuously turn the steering wheel during cornering is significant. Because the steering return phenomenon of the steering wheel stop like this is not preferable, PD steering assistance should be extremely weak (almost 0) during normal cornering. Alternatively, during drift cornering, during which the grip area of the tires is exceeded, PD steering assistance is helpful because the driver has good control over counter-steering. Moreover, the use of PD steering assistance is preferable during lane changes because the response and settling of a vehicle is greatly improved when PD steering assistance is used. Based on these considerations, a previous report examined steering method controls in which the PD steering assistance constant was incorporated along with the drivers’ perception changes in certain driving situations. This study aimed to determine a suitable PD steering assistance constant in relation to the driving situation. A proper PD steering assistance constant was found to exist for specific driving situations. Based on the results of gaze detection using an eye mark recorder, the study was able to reduce the right and left difference of the gaze at the driver by controlling PD steering assistance using a proper PD steering assistance constant for various driving situations.