US 11,952,001 B1Granted

Autonomous vehicle safety system validation

AssigneeZoox, Inc.

InventorsChuang Wang, Leonardo Poubel Orenstein, Tod Cameron Semple, James Graham Dolan, Takahiro Baba, Matthew Lotocki

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Abstract

Driving simulations may be generated based on driving log data and used to validate autonomous vehicle safety systems. A driving simulation system may receive driving log data from autonomous vehicles and determine events which caused a vehicle to diverge from a planned trajectory. Driving simulations may be generated based on the driving log data, and executed using a simulated vehicle that follows the initial planned trajectory of the autonomous vehicle. The driving simulations may be analyzed to detect potential collisions and near misses, and to determine success conditions for the behaviors of vehicle safety systems. Driving simulations and associated success conditions may be aggregated and used in validation suites for vehicle controllers and/or vehicle safety systems, thereby providing more comprehensive and robust autonomous vehicle validation based on real-world driving scenarios.

Claims20

Dependent claims

A system comprising:

one or more processors;
and
one or more non-transitory computer-readable media storing computer-executable instructions that, when executed, cause the system to perform operations comprising:
receiving log data associated with a vehicle, the log data representing a driving scenario of the vehicle operating in an environment;
determining a log time within the log data at which the vehicle diverges from a trajectory generated by a route planning component of the vehicle;
executing a simulation representing the driving scenario, wherein executing the simulation includes:
controlling a simulated vehicle to follow the trajectory within the simulation, from a first simulation time associated with the log time, to a second simulation time after the first simulation time;
and
determining, at the second simulation time, a distance between the simulated vehicle and a simulated object within the simulation;
determining, based at least in part on the distance, a success condition associated with the simulation;
determining a response of a safety system to a simulated driving scenario, based at least in part on the success condition;
and
configuring an autonomous vehicle to use the safety system, based at least in part on the response of the safety system to the simulated driving scenario.

10 more elements

One or more non-transitory computer-readable media storing processor-executable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations comprising:

receiving log data comprising a driving scenario of a vehicle operating in an environment;
determining, based at least in part on the log data, an event time associated with an event indicative of an impact on nominal operation of the vehicle;
executing a simulation representing the driving scenario, wherein executing the simulation includes:
determining, from the log data, a trajectory determined by the vehicle at the event time;
and
controlling a simulated vehicle to follow the trajectory within the simulation, from a first simulation time associated with the event time, to a second simulation time;
and
determining, based at least in part on a state of the simulated vehicle relative to a simulated object at the second simulation time, a success condition associated with the simulation, wherein the success condition includes a vehicle safety system behavior.

5 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.