Back to results
US 11,112,793 B2Granted
Mixed-mode driving of a vehicle having autonomous driving capabilities
AssigneeMotional AD LLC
InventorsEmilio Frazzoli, Harshavardhan Ravichandran, Eric Wolff, Hsun-Hsien Chang
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Among other things, a vehicle having autonomous driving capabilities is operated in a mixed driving mode.
Claims21
A method comprising:
- receiving sensor information from one or more sensors from each vehicle in a fleet of vehicles, each vehicle comprising an autonomous driving capability, wherein the sensor information indicates a state of occupancy of the vehicle indicating that the vehicle is occupied;
- determining, at a server and based on the state of occupancy and a collision risk to at least one vehicle in the fleet of vehicles or objects surrounding the at least one vehicle, a next driving mode transition from a current driving mode, a next driving mode comprising at least one of an autonomous driving mode, a manual driving mode, and a driving mode that uses a combination of autonomous driving capabilities and manual driving capabilities, wherein determining the next driving mode transition includes determining, based on the state of occupancy of the at least one vehicle, a threshold of driving smoothness for the next driving mode transition for the at least one vehicle;
- gradually adjusting a change in speed of the at least one vehicle during the driving mode transition from the current driving mode to the next driving mode in accordance with the threshold of driving smoothness;
- and
- sending signals wirelessly to the at least one vehicle of the fleet identifying, based on the determined next driving mode transition and the determined smoothing operation, the next driving mode for the at least one vehicle.
2 more elements
An apparatus comprising:
- one or more processors;
- and
- a memory storage in data communication with the one or more processors, the memory storage storing instructions executable by the one or more processors and that upon such execution cause the one or more processors to perform operations of:
- receiving sensor information from one or more sensors from each vehicle in a fleet of vehicles, each vehicle comprising an autonomous driving capability, wherein the sensor information indicates a state of occupancy indicating that the vehicle is occupied;
- determining, at a server and based on the state of occupancy and a collision risk to at least one vehicle in the fleet of vehicles or objects surrounding the at least one vehicle, a next driving mode transition from a current driving mode, a next driving mode comprising at least one of an autonomous driving mode, a manual driving mode, and a driving mode that uses a combination of autonomous driving capabilities and manual driving capabilities, wherein determining the next driving mode transition includes determining, based on the state of occupancy of the at least one vehicle, a threshold of driving smoothness for the next driving mode transition for the at least one vehicle;
- gradually adjusting a change in speed of the at least one vehicle during the driving mode transition from the current driving mode to the next driving mode in accordance with the threshold of driving smoothness;
- and
- sending signals wirelessly to the at least one vehicle of the fleet identifying, based on the determined next driving mode transition and the determined smoothing operation, the next driving mode for the at least one vehicle.
5 more elements
A non-transitory computer storage medium encoded with a computer program, the program comprising instructions that when executed by data processing apparatus cause the data processing apparatus to perform operations of:
- receiving sensor information from one or more sensors from each vehicle in a fleet of vehicles, each vehicle comprising an autonomous driving capability, wherein the sensor information indicates a state of occupancy of the vehicle indicating that the vehicle is occupied;
- determining, at a server and based on the received sensor information, the state of occupancy and a collision risk to at least one vehicle in the fleet of vehicles or objects surrounding the at least one vehicle, a next driving mode transition from a current driving mode, a next driving mode comprising at least one or an autonomous driving mode, a manual driving mode, and a driving mode that uses a combination of autonomous driving capabilities and manual driving capabilities, wherein determining the next driving mode transition includes determining, based on the state of occupancy of the at least one vehicle, a threshold of driving smoothness for the next driving mode transition for the at least one vehicle;
- gradually adjusting a change in speed of the at least one vehicle during the driving mode transition from the current driving mode to the next driving mode in accordance with the threshold of driving smoothness;
- and
- sending signals wirelessly to the at least one vehicle of the fleet identifying, based on the determined next driving mode transition and the determined smoothing operation, the next driving mode for the at least one vehicle.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.