Patents Examined by Anne Marie Antonucci
  • Patent number: 11555708
    Abstract: A vehicle includes: an input configured to receive a destination; a display; a driver assistance system configured to control a behavior of the vehicle based on surrounding environment information; and a controller configured to control the display to display a driving route. The controller may be configured to determine, when a distance between a branch point on the driving route and the vehicle reaches a first distance, a possibility that the vehicle deviates from the driving route based on GPS information, vehicle speed information, and the surrounding environment information, and search for, when the possibility is greater than or equal to a preset threshold, a deviation route for reaching the destination based on the deviated direction and control the display to display the deviation route until the distance between the branch point on the driving route and the vehicle reaches a second distance.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 12, 2021
    Date of Patent: January 17, 2023
    Assignees: Hyundai Motor Company, Kia Motors Corporation
    Inventor: Yongho Lee
  • Patent number: 11550622
    Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for allocating tasks to be performed by one or more autonomous vehicles to achieve a mission objective. Generally, a task allocation system identifies a final task associated with a given mission objective, identifies predecessor tasks necessary to complete the final task, generates one or more candidate tasks sequences to accomplish the mission objective, generates a task allocation tree based on the candidate task sequences, and searches the task allocation tree to find a task allocation plan that meets a predetermined selection criteria (e.g., lowest cost). Based on the task allocation plan, the task allocation system determines a task execution plan and generates control data for controlling one or more autonomous vehicles to complete the task execution plan.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 5, 2019
    Date of Patent: January 10, 2023
    Assignee: AURORA FLIGHT SCIENCES CORPORATION
    Inventor: Jeffery Saunders
  • Patent number: 11548520
    Abstract: A system for controlling an autonomous vehicle includes a memory configured to store parameters of a g-g plot defining admissible space of values of longitudinal and lateral accelerations. The g-g plot parameters define a mapping between user driving preferences and constrained control of the autonomous vehicle. The g-g plot parameters include a maximum forward acceleration, a maximum backward acceleration, a maximum lateral acceleration and a shape parameter defining profile of curves connecting maximum values of forward, backward, and lateral accelerations. The system accepts a comfort level as a feedback from a passenger of the vehicle, determines a dominant parameter corresponding to the feedback, updates the dominant parameter of the g-g plot based on the comfort level indicated in the feedback, and controls the vehicle to maintain dynamics of the vehicle within the admissible space defined by the parameters of the updated g-g plot.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 11, 2019
    Date of Patent: January 10, 2023
    Assignee: Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories, Inc.
    Inventors: Uros Kalabic, Ankush Chakrabarty, Stefano Di Cairano
  • Patent number: 11548518
    Abstract: In one embodiment, a method by a computing system of a vehicle includes determining an environment of the vehicle. The method includes generating, based on the environment, multiple proposed vehicle actions with associated operational data. The method includes determining a comfort level for each proposed vehicle action by processing the environment and operational data using a model for predicting comfort levels of vehicle actions. The model is trained using records of performed vehicle actions. The record for each performed vehicle action includes environment data, operational data, and a perceived passenger comfort level for the performed vehicle action. The method includes selecting a vehicle action from the proposed vehicle actions based on the determined comfort level. The method includes causing the vehicle to perform the selected vehicle action.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 28, 2019
    Date of Patent: January 10, 2023
    Assignee: Woven Planet North America, Inc.
    Inventors: Sammy Omari, Emil Praun, Sameer Qureshi, Matt Vitelli
  • Patent number: 11543818
    Abstract: There is provided a cargo transport system including: a management device; and a plurality of automated guided vehicles. Each of the automated guided vehicles includes: a movement instruction receiving unit that receives, from the management device, a movement instruction for moving to at least one loading operation place where a loading operation of loading a cargo to be transported into the automated guided vehicle is performed or a specified position near the loading operation place; an information transmitting unit that transmits, to the management device, load information concerning a load state of the cargo loaded into the automated guided vehicle; and a traveling unit that performs automated traveling in accordance with the received movement instruction. The management device includes: a movement instruction management unit that transmits the movement instruction to each of the automated guided vehicles; a load information receiving unit; and a load amount management unit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 17, 2017
    Date of Patent: January 3, 2023
    Assignee: SHARP KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventors: Hiroki Osawa, Masahiro Sakakibara, Takahiro Ueno
  • Patent number: 11543824
    Abstract: Aspects of the disclosure provide for controlling an autonomous vehicle to respond to queuing behaviors at pickup or drop-off locations. As an example, a request to pick up or drop off a passenger at a location may be received. The location may be determined to likely have a queue for picking up and dropping off passengers. Based on sensor data received from a perception system, whether a queue exists at the location may be determined. Once it is determined that a queue exists, it may be determined whether to join the queue to avoid inconveniencing other road users. Based on the determination to join the queue, the vehicle may be controlled to join the queue.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 9, 2018
    Date of Patent: January 3, 2023
    Assignee: Waymo LLC
    Inventors: John Wesley Dyer, Michael Epstein
  • Patent number: 11535250
    Abstract: A travel controller including an information acquisition part configured to acquire brake state information of a braking device of a host vehicle and an ACC-ECU configured to perform travel control, wherein the travel control includes constant speed travel control and headway travel control. The constant speed travel control is configured to control the host vehicle to travel at constant speed in accordance with a preset target vehicle speed. The headway travel control is configured to control the host vehicle to travel by following another vehicle travelling ahead so that a predetermined inter-vehicle distance in maintained with the other vehicle and the host vehicle travels in accordance with the target vehicle speed. In the ACC-ECU, when a braking performance index of the host vehicle has a “declined value”, a target acceleration of Example 1 takes a reduced value compared to the target acceleration of Comparative Example for a common distance difference.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 28, 2020
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2022
    Assignee: HONDA MOTOR CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Takashi Horiguchi, Yoshimichi Kawamoto, Satoshi Matsushita
  • Patent number: 11536581
    Abstract: An embodiment takes the form of a system that obtains application-usage data from a personal mobile device of a vehicle operator of a vehicle. The application-usage data reflects a usage, during operation of the vehicle, of an application on the personal mobile device. The system identifies a vehicle feature, of the vehicle, that provides a vehicle functionality similar to an application functionality provided by the application on the personal mobile device, and performs a comparison of the obtained application-usage data with feature-usage data. The feature-usage data reflects a usage, during operation of the vehicle, of the identified vehicle feature. The system determines, based on the comparison, a usage preference for the application during operation of the vehicle over the identified vehicle feature.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 11, 2019
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2022
    Assignee: TOYOTA MOTOR ENGINEERING & MANUFACTURING NORTH AMERICA, INC.
    Inventor: Clinton Williams
  • Patent number: 11536584
    Abstract: There is provided a technique that can appropriately display route icons. A map display system includes a display section obtaining part that obtains display sections each being a section of a route to be displayed on a map; a connecting point obtaining part that obtains a connecting point, the connecting point being a point where different routes are connected together on the display sections; and a map display part that displays at least one route icon for each split section, the route icon being an image associated with a route, and the split section being obtained by splitting each of the display sections by the connecting point.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 21, 2019
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2022
    Assignees: AISIN CORPORATION, TOYOTA JIDOSHA KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventors: Toshiyuki Hirano, Kazuya Ueda, Xin Jin
  • Patent number: 11537122
    Abstract: A method for controlling a motor vehicle remotely. The method includes: receiving safety condition signals, which represent at least one safety condition that must be satisfied, so that the motor vehicle may be controlled remotely; checking if the at least one safety condition is satisfied; generating remote control signals for controlling the motor vehicle remotely, based on a result of the check as to whether the at least one safety condition is satisfied; and outputting the remote control signals generated. A device, a computer program and a machine-readable storage medium, are also described.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 21, 2020
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2022
    Assignee: Robert Bosch GmbH
    Inventor: Stefan Nordbruch
  • Patent number: 11537142
    Abstract: A robot repositioning method is provided. A position deviation caused by excessive accumulation of a walking error of a robot may be corrected to implement repositioning by taking a path that the robot walks along an edge of an isolated object as a reference, so that the positioning accuracy and walking efficiency of the robot during subsequent navigation and walking are improved.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 10, 2019
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2022
    Assignee: AMICRO SEMICONDUCTOR CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Yongyong Li, Gangjun Xiao
  • Patent number: 11535373
    Abstract: A system for both onboard piloting and remote piloting an aircraft having thereon at least one onboard pilot includes an aircraft having an onboard flight control system, onboard flight control devices, and onboard condition indicators mounted proximal the pilot seat. A remote flight control system, in electronic communication with the onboard flight control system, includes remote flight control devices and remote condition indicators. At least in a remote piloting mode, the onboard flight control system transmits flight and aircraft condition-related signals to the remote flight control system, receives flight control signals from the remote flight control system, and actuates, according to the flight control signals received from the remote flight control system, onboard actuators thereby remote piloting the aircraft. In the remote piloting mode, the aircraft may be cooperatively piloted by a remote pilot and at least one alert onboard pilot as another onboard pilot rests.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 29, 2019
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2022
    Assignee: B/E Aerospace, Inc.
    Inventor: Glenn A. Johnson
  • Patent number: 11530527
    Abstract: A computer-implemented method for controlling an excavation task by an autonomous excavation vehicle comprising a scanning device, the excavation task being described by a target map, the method comprising using an excavation vehicle control system for: a) according to data from the scanning device, maintaining a map representing current terrain; b) moving a sensor-equipped digging implement for executing an excavation operation; c) receiving data indicative of current terrain topography from the sensor; d) updating the maintained map according to the data indicative of current terrain topography; and e) calculating an excavation operation according to the difference between the maintained map and the target map.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 10, 2019
    Date of Patent: December 20, 2022
    Assignee: ELTA SYSTEMS LTD.
    Inventors: Ofir Cohen, Dina Appelman
  • Patent number: 11529971
    Abstract: The present application discloses a method and an apparatus for autonomous driving control, an electronic device, and a storage medium; the application relates to the technical field of autonomous driving. A specific implementation solution is: obtaining movement data of a pedestrian, where the movement data includes a velocity component of the pedestrian along a width direction of a lane and a time of duration that the pedestrian cuts into a driving path of the autonomous vehicle from one side; determining a movement direction of the pedestrian according to the movement data and the movement information of the pedestrian; and generating a driving strategy for the autonomous vehicle according to the movement direction of the pedestrian. Therefore, the movement direction of the pedestrian can be accurately predicted, which facilitates the autonomous vehicle to avoid the pedestrian and insures driving safety.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 25, 2020
    Date of Patent: December 20, 2022
    Inventors: Dongchun Yao, Leibing Lv, Jingjing Xue, Fan Zhu
  • Patent number: 11526174
    Abstract: The disclosure herein generally relates to the field of autonomous navigation, and, more particularly, to a diverse trajectory proposal for autonomous navigation. The embodiment discloses a hierarchical network based diverse trajectory proposal for autonomous navigation. The hierarchical 2-stage neural network architecture maps the perceived surroundings to diverse trajectories in the form of trajectory waypoints, that an autonomous navigation system can choose to navigate/traverse. The first stage of the disclosed hierarchical 2-stage Neural Network architecture is a Trajectory Proposal Network which generates a set of diverse traversable regions in an environment which can be occupied by the autonomous navigation system in the future. The second stage is a Trajectory Sampling network which predicts a fine-grained trajectory/trajectory waypoint over the diverse traversable regions proposed by Trajectory Proposal Network.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 5, 2020
    Date of Patent: December 13, 2022
    Assignee: TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES LIMITED
    Inventors: Brojeshwar Bhowmick, Krishnam Madhava Krishna, Sriram Nochur Narayanan, Gourav Kumar, Abhay Singh, Siva Karthik Mustikovela, Saket Saurav
  • Patent number: 11525697
    Abstract: A system configured to autonomously operate a vehicle within an environment is disclosed herein. The system includes a vehicle including a sensing system with a single active sensor configured to detect objects within an environment as the vehicle travels on a journey along a travel path within the environment. The system further includes a computing system communicably coupled to the vehicle. The computing system includes a memory configured to store a three-dimensional map of the environment, and a processor configured to determine an updated pose of the vehicle based on the three-dimensional map and input from the single active sensor of the vehicle. The processor is further configured to generate an updated travel path for the vehicle, wherein the updated travel path is generated based on the updated pose of the vehicle within the environment determined by the computing system.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 5, 2021
    Date of Patent: December 13, 2022
    Assignee: Near Earth Autonomy, Inc.
    Inventors: Ji Zhang, Sanjiv Singh
  • Patent number: 11519743
    Abstract: Aspects of the present invention disclose a method for assisting a stalled autonomous vehicle in an incommunicable area. The method includes one or more processors determining a route of an autonomous vehicle. The method further includes identifying an area of the route of the autonomous vehicle that includes a communication outage. The method further includes determining a driving difficulty of one or more segments of the route of the autonomous vehicle within the area. The method further includes determining a location of the autonomous vehicle within a segment of the one or more segments of the route based at least in part on the driving difficulty of the segment.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 17, 2020
    Date of Patent: December 6, 2022
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Yuka Sasaki, Reiya Takemura, Kenji Uchida, Sanehiro Furuichi
  • Patent number: 11523038
    Abstract: An aerial vehicle system, such as an unmanned aerial vehicle, that includes a camera system with replaceable camera modules that have different spectral, optical and/or sensing characteristics from one another. By replacing one camera module with another camera module, different information can be gathered and analyzed by the camera system of the aerial vehicle system.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 24, 2019
    Date of Patent: December 6, 2022
    Assignee: Sentera, Inc.
    Inventors: Ryan Nelson, Alex Stephens
  • Patent number: 11520460
    Abstract: The present invention provides a system and method onboard a host vehicle for identifying, tagging and reporting hazardous drivers in adjacent vehicles in the vicinity of the host vehicle and displaying a message on a display of the tagged adjacent vehicle visible outside the tagged vehicle.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 6, 2018
    Date of Patent: December 6, 2022
    Assignee: United Services Automobile Association (USAA)
    Inventors: Matthew T. Flachsbart, Ameer A. Noorani, Bradly Jay Billman, Snehal Desai, Cory Matheson, James Phillip Hillman, Andrew L. Anaruk
  • Patent number: 11513528
    Abstract: A method for docking a robot at a charging station includes the following steps: the charging station outputs a first transmitting signal and a second transmitting signal, wherein an overlapping zone and two non-overlapping zones are formed within the signal transmission range of the first and second transmitting signals, and a blank zone forms within a predetermined distance. When the robot needs to move to the charging station, the robot detects its entry into the overlapping zone or one of the two non-overlapping zones, and the robot moves in the direction of the charging station by alternately moving in and out between the overlapping zone and one of the two non-overlapping zones until the robot moves to the blank zone, then the robot either moves directly towards the charging station, or rotates and then moves backwardly towards the charging station, thereby allowing the robot to dock at the charging station.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 30, 2020
    Date of Patent: November 29, 2022
    Inventor: Jason Yan