Connected and Automated Vehicles

This project studied the feasibility of constructing an autonomous vehicle controller based on probabilistic inference and utility maximization. Several theoretical and algorithmic advances were required in order to create an inference system capable of handling vehicle monitoring in a real-time fashion. New methods were also developed for learning probabilistic models from data, and for learning control policies given reward/penalty feedback.

This study reports on a preliminary design of a health monitoring system for automated vehicles. A new detailed nonlinear vehicle simulation which extends the current simulation is documented and will be used as a future testbed for evaluating the performance of the health monitoring system. A health monitoring system has been constructed for the lateral and longitudinal modes that monitors twelve sensors and three actuators. The approach is to fuse data from dissimilar instruments using modeled dynamic relationships and fault detection and identification filters.

A Fuzzy logic controller (FLC) is designed and implemented in real time on a Toyota Celica test vehicle to achieve control of the lateral motion of the vehicle. The structure of the FLC is modularized as a feedback, preview, and gain scheduling rule base. The parameters of the FLC are tuned manually using information from characteristics of human driving operation and an existing controller. The fuzzy logic control strategies are implemented on the test vehicle, automatically following a multiple curved track using discrete magnetic markers as a lateral error reference system. The test...

The advance in research and development will make the deployment of automated vehicles a reality in the near future. The principal question is whether these technologies will lead to any benefits in terms of safety, capacity and traffic flow characteristics as they penetrate the current transportation system. Another aspect is how to exploit these technologies in order to achieve benefits without adversely affecting the efficiency of the current transportation system and the drivers who cannot afford them. The penetration of automated vehicles into the existing transportation system will...