The Fraunhofer Institute for Reliability and Microintegration IZM has teamed up with a range of partners from both industry (InnoSenT, Silicon Radar, Jabil Optics Germany, AVL, John Deere) and research institutes (Fraunhofer Institute for Open Communication Systems FOKUS, DCAITI) to develop a camera radar module that is significantly faster in capturing changes in traffic conditions.
The unit, which is no bigger than a smartphone, will have a reaction time of less than 10 milliseconds – which, according to a study conducted by the University of Michigan, makes it 50 times faster than current sensor systems and 160 times faster than the average human driver.
The real innovation in the new system is its integrated signal processing capacity. This allows for all processing to take place directly within the module, with the system selectively filtering data from the radar system and stereo camera so that processing can either take place immediately or else be intentionally delayed until a subsequent processing stage.
Non-relevant information is recognised, but not forwarded. Sensor fusion is applied to combine the data from the camera and radar. Neural networks then evaluate the data and determine the real-world traffic implications based on machine learning techniques. As a result, the system has no need to send status information to the vehicle, but solely reaction instruction, freeing up the vehicle’s bus line to deal with important signals, for instance detecting a child suddenly running out onto the road.
“Integrated signal processing drastically cuts down reaction times,” explained Christian Tschoban, group head in the RF & Smart Sensor Systems department.
Together with his colleagues, Tschoban is working on the KameRad project. The functioning demonstrator he and his team have developed looks like a grey box with eyes to the right and left – the stereo cameras. The project runs until 2020. Until then, project partners AVL List GmbH and DCAITI will be testing an initial prototype, including road testing in Berlin.
Tschoban said that he hoped that in a few years’ time this “grey box” would be fitted as standard in every vehicle, bringing added safety to automated inner-city traffic.
