Detecting positioning of a sensor system associated with a vehicle

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12399496-B2
Application number	US-202016916008-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 29, 2020
Priority date	Jun 29, 2020
Publication date	Aug 26, 2025
Grant date	Aug 26, 2025

Abstract

Examples disclosed herein may involve a computing system that is operable to (i) identify, within a given period of operation of a vehicle having an associated sensor system for capturing sensor data, one or more times when the vehicle was driving in a lane having substantially-straight lane geometry, (ii) for each identified time, determine a respective measure of a lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and a lateral reference point of the vehicle, and (iii) based on the respective measure of the lateral offset that is determined for each of the one or more identified times, determine the lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral reference point of the vehicle.

First claim

We claim:

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:
identifying, based on steering-angle information for a vehicle having an associated sensor system for capturing sensor data, at least two times within a given period of operation of the vehicle when the vehicle was driving in a lane having substantially-straight lane geometry;
for each identified time when the vehicle was driving in a lane having substantially-straight lane geometry, determining a respective measure of a lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and a lateral reference point of the vehicle based on an inference that, because the lane had substantially-straight lane geometry at the identified time, the vehicle was laterally centered within the lane at the identified time;
based on the respective measure of the lateral offset that is determined for each of the at least two identified times, determining the lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral reference point of the vehicle, wherein determining the lateral offset comprises aggregating the respective measures of the lateral offsets that are determined for the at least two identified times; and
deriving a trajectory for the vehicle based on a combination of both (i) sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system and (ii) the determined lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral reference point of the vehicle.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein deriving the trajectory for the vehicle based on the combination of (i) the sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system and (ii) the determined lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral reference point of the vehicle comprises:
applying processing to the sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system and thereby deriving a trajectory for the vehicle's associated sensor system; and
using the determined lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral reference point of the vehicle to translate the trajectory for the vehicle's associated sensor system into the trajectory for the vehicle.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising identifying additional times within the given period of operation of the vehicle when the vehicle was driving in a lane having substantially-straight lane geometry by:
localizing the vehicle's associated sensor system within a map encoded with lane geometry information, wherein the localizing produces a set of location points for the vehicle's associated sensor system within the map that each corresponds to a respective time during the given period of operation; and
for each of at least two location points in the set of location points:
obtaining lane geometry information for a road segment surrounding the location point;
based on the obtained lane geometry information, determining that the road segment surrounding the location point has less than a threshold extent of curvature; and
in response to the determining that the road segment surrounding the location point has less than the threshold extent of curvature, identifying the respective time corresponding to the location point as one additional time when the vehicle was driving in a lane having substantially-straight lane geometry.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein deriving the trajectory for the vehicle based on the combination of (i) the sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system and (ii) the determined lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral reference point of the vehicle comprises:
using the determined lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral reference point of the vehicle to adjust the sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system; and
applying processing to the adjusted sensor data and thereby deriving the trajectory for the vehicle.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the lateral reference point of the vehicle comprises a lateral center of the vehicle.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 5 , wherein determining the respective measure of the lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral center of the vehicle for a given time within the given period of operation comprises:
detecting at least one lane boundary of a given lane in which the vehicle was driving at the given time;
determining a first lateral distance between the at least one detected lane boundary and the vehicle's associated sensor system;
determining a second lateral distance between the at least one detected lane boundary and a lateral centerline of the given lane; and
based on the first lateral distance and the second lateral distance, determining the respective measure of the lateral offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and the lateral center of the vehicle for the given time.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 6 , wherein detecting the at least one lane boundary of the given lane in which the vehicle was driving at the given time comprises:
based on an analysis of sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system at or near the given time, detecting at least one object that is indicative of a lane boundary.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining elevation information for a vertical reference point related to the vehicle during the given period of operation based on one or more of (i) map data, (ii) sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system during the given period of operation, or (iii) information regarding the vehicle's physical dimensions.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein aggregating the respective measures of the lateral offsets that are determined for the at least two identified times comprises:
calculating an unweighted or weighted average of the respective measures of the lateral offsets.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein aggregating the respective measures of the lateral offsets that are determined for the at least two identified times comprises:
identifying a given time frame within the given period of operation during which a position of the vehicle's associated sensor system did not change relative to the vehicle;
identifying a subset of the at least two identified times that fall within the given time frame; and
aggregating the respective measures of the lateral offsets for the identified subset of the at least two identified times.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining a longitudinal offset between the vehicle's associated sensor system and a longitudinal reference point of the vehicle based on sensor data captured by the vehicle's associated sensor system during the given period of operation and information regarding the vehicle's physical dimensions.

12. A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising program instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor of a computing system, cause the computing system to perform functions comprising:
identifying, based on steering-angle information for a vehicle having an associated sensor system for capturing sensor data, at least two times within a given period of operation of the vehicle when the vehicle was driving in a lane having substantially-straight lane geometry;
for each identified time when the vehicle was driving in a lane having substantially-straight lane geometry, determining a respective measure of a lateral offset b

Assignees

• Lyft Inc

Inventors

• Agon Alan
• Benisch Michael Jared
• Lee Mason
• Qureshi Sameer
• Vincent Luc

Classifications

• B60W50/00 Primary

  Details of control systems for road vehicle drive control not related to the control of a particular sub-unit {, e.g. process diagnostic or vehicle driver interfaces} · CPC title

• B60W2420/40

  Photo, light or radio wave sensitive means, e.g. infrared sensors · CPC title

• G05D2111/10

  Optical signals · CPC title

• G06V20/588

  Recognition of the road, e.g. of lane markings; Recognition of the vehicle driving pattern in relation to the road · CPC title

• B60W2520/06

  Direction of travel · CPC title