Systems and methods for quantifying complexity of external environments for vehicles and testing thereof

A method, comprising:

• generating, with one or more processors, models of driving scenarios that include a vehicle traveling through an external environment outside of the vehicle, wherein the external environment includes a plurality of actors having static and dynamic attributes;
• generating, with the one or more processors, complexity scores indicative of complexities of the static and dynamic attributes of the plurality of actors in the external environment for each of the driving scenarios;
• assigning, with the one or more processors, each of the driving scenarios to a corresponding one of two or more categories based on the corresponding complexity scores of each of the driving scenarios;
• and
• performing, with the one or more processors, a vehicle simulation test using a first category of the two or more categories in order to test an automated driving system (ADS) of the vehicle to evaluate performance of the ADS, wherein the performance of the ADS in the vehicle simulation test is representative of the performance of the ADS in each of the driving scenarios assigned to the first category.

A system for a vehicle, comprising:

• a sensor system including sensing devices configured to sense observable conditions in an external environment outside of the vehicle;
• and
• a controller in operable communication with the sensor system, wherein the controller is configured to, by one or more processors:
• receive, from the sensor system, sensor data indicative of the observable conditions in the external environment;
• process the sensor data to determine static and dynamic attributes of actors in the external environment;
• generate a complexity score indicative of a complexity of the static and dynamic attributes of the actors in the external environment;
• and
• provide the complexity score to one or more other systems of the vehicle to modify operation of the vehicle based on the complexity score.