US 12,759,591 B1Granted

Occlusion detection and monitoring

AssigneeZoox, Inc.

InventorsLakshay Garg, Max Gier, Akash Arora, Weifu Wang

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Abstract

Techniques are discussed for controlling a vehicle, such as an autonomous vehicle, based on occluded regions in an environment. A system may receive a path associated with an autonomous vehicle traversing an environment. A system may detect a road segment associated with an intersection of the path and a path of a potential object. A system may determine, based at least in part on a termination condition, a length along the road segment. A system may determine, based on environment data and sensor data associated with the autonomous vehicle, an occluded region along the road segment within the length. A system may determine whether the occluded region is relevant. A system may determine, based on a minimum time to collision and determining that the occluded region is relevant, a heatmap of cost values associated with the occluded region. A system may control the autonomous vehicle based on the heatmap.

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 one or more processors to perform operations comprising:
receiving a path associated with an autonomous vehicle traversing an environment;
detecting a road segment associated with an intersection of the path and a path of a potential object;
determining that the intersection satisfies a relevance condition, wherein the relevance condition indicates to process the intersection for a potential occlusion;
determining, based at least in part on a termination condition and the intersection satisfying the relevance condition, a length along the road segment and a set of additional road segments, wherein at least one of the set of additional road segments connects to the road segment, wherein the termination condition is defined based on one or more of a threshold number of predefined roadway features or a threshold distance;
determining, based on environment data and sensor data associated with the autonomous vehicle, an occluded region within the length;
determining, based on a minimum time to collision and determining that the occluded region is relevant, a heatmap of cost values associated with the occluded region, wherein a cost value in the heatmap represents a prediction about how long it will take for an occluded vehicle to arrive at a first position associated with the intersection from a second position associated with the occluded region;
and
controlling the autonomous vehicle based on the heatmap.

8 more elements

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

detecting a road segment associated with an intersection of a path associated with a vehicle traversing an environment and a path of a potential object;
determining that the intersection is a relevant intersection based at least in part on determining that the intersection satisfies a relevance condition, wherein the relevance condition indicates to process the intersection for a potential occlusion;
determining, based at least in part on a termination condition, a length along the road segment and a set of additional road segments, wherein at least one of the set of additional road segments connects to the road segment, wherein the road segment is at least partially within a boundary of the relevant intersection;
determining, based on environment data and sensor data associated with the vehicle, an occluded region associated with the length along the road segment and the set of additional road segments;
determining a cost value based on determining that the occluded region is relevant, wherein the cost value represents a prediction about how long it will take for an occluded vehicle to arrive at a first position associated with the intersection from a second position associated with the occluded region;
and
controlling the vehicle based on the cost value.

4 more elements

A method comprising:

detecting a road segment associated with an intersection of a path associated with a vehicle traversing an environment and a path of a potential object;
determining that the intersection is a relevant intersection based at least in part on determining that the intersection satisfies a relevance condition, wherein the relevance condition indicates to process the intersection for a potential occlusion;
determining, based at least in part on a termination condition, a length along the road segment and a set of additional road segments, wherein at least one of the set of additional road segments connects to the road segment, wherein the road segment is at least partially within a boundary of the relevant intersection;
determining, based on environment data and sensor data associated with the vehicle, an occluded region associated with the length along the road segment and the set of additional road segments;
determining, based on the environment data and the sensor data associated with the vehicle, the occluded region within the length;
determining a cost value based on determining that the occluded region is relevant, wherein the cost value represents a prediction about how long it will take for an occluded vehicle to arrive at a first position associated with the intersection from a second position associated with the occluded region;
and
controlling the vehicle based on the cost value.

5 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.