Gaze-based vehicle-to-vehicle communication system and method

A vehicle comprising:

• an eye tracker for tracking a gaze of an occupant of the vehicle and to generate gaze direction data;
• a processor communicatively connected to the eye tracker to receive the gaze direction data, wherein the processor is configured to use the gaze direction data to determine if the occupant is gazing at a nearby vehicle sensed by a vehicle-detecting sensor, wherein the sensor is a camera, LIDAR or RADAR;
• wherein the processor is configured to determine an identification of the nearby vehicle by optically recognizing characters of a license plate of the nearby vehicle using the camera, or by detecting an identification beacon broadcast by the nearby vehicle using a short-range vehicle-to-vehicle transceiver;
• a radiofrequency cellular transceiver cooperating with the processor to transmit a communication-availability query message to a remote server to look up the identification of the vehicle and to receive a communication-availability reply message from the remote server indicating either a communication availability or communication unavailability of the nearby vehicle;
• wherein the processor cooperates with the radiofrequency cellular transceiver or the short-range vehicle-to-vehicle transceiver to initiate a voice communication with the nearby vehicle in response to the communication-availability reply message indicating the communication availability of the nearby vehicle.

A vehicle comprising:

• a first head tracker for inferring a first gaze of a first occupant of the vehicle and to generate first gaze direction data;
• a second head tracker for inferring a second gaze of a first second of the vehicle and to generate second gaze direction data;
• a processor communicatively connected to the first head tracker and to the second head tracker to receive the first gaze direction data and the second gaze direction data, wherein the processor is configured to compare the first gaze direction data and the second gaze direction data to determine if the first occupant and the second occupant are both gazing at a nearby vehicle sensed by a vehicle-detecting sensor, wherein the sensor is a camera, LIDAR or RADAR;
• wherein the processor is configured to determine an identification of the nearby vehicle by optically recognizing characters of a license plate of the nearby vehicle using the camera, or by detecting an identification beacon broadcast by the nearby vehicle using a short-range vehicle-to-vehicle transceiver;
• a radiofrequency cellular transceiver cooperating with the processor to transmit a communication-availability query message to a remote server to look up the identification of the vehicle and to receive a communication-availability reply message from the remote server indicating either a communication availability or communication unavailability of the nearby vehicle;
• wherein the processor cooperates with the radiofrequency cellular transceiver or the short-range vehicle-to-vehicle transceiver to initiate a voice communication with the nearby vehicle in response to the communication-availability reply message indicating the communication availability of the nearby vehicle.