MSGID: 1:317/3 64a794fc   
   PID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
   TID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
    Testing real driverless cars in a virtual environment    
    In an empty parking lot, a car 'thinks' it is on a real road    
      
     Date:   
         July 6, 2023   
     Source:   
         Ohio State University   
     Summary:   
         Researchers have developed new software to aid in the development,   
         evaluation and demonstration of safer autonomous, or driverless,   
         vehicles. Called the Vehicle-in-Virtual-Environment (VVE) method,   
         it allows the testing of driverless cars in a perfectly safe   
         environment.   
      
      
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   FULL STORY   
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   Researchers at The Ohio State University have developed new software to   
   aid in the development, evaluation and demonstration of safer autonomous,   
   or driverless, vehicles.   
      
   Called the Vehicle-in-Virtual-Environment (VVE) method, it allows the   
   testing of driverless cars in a perfectly safe environment, said Bilin   
   Aksun-Guvenc, co-author of the study and a professor of mechanical and   
   aerospace engineering at Ohio State.   
      
   Imagine a driverless car is placed in the middle of an empty parking lot.   
      
   Although it is driving, it isn't reacting to the real world, but to   
   input from the software, which tells the car what the road looks like,   
   and what cars, pedestrians and hazards it is meeting along the way.   
      
   "With our software, we're able to make the vehicle think that it's   
   driving on actual roads while actually operating on a large open,   
   safe test area," said Aksun-Guvenc. "This ability saves time, money,   
   and there is no risk of fatal traffic accidents."  The study, published   
   recently in the journal Sensors, found that by immersing self-driving   
   machines in a virtual environment, the technique can help the car learn   
   to avoid possible car collisions, increase pedestrian safety, and react   
   to rare or extreme traffic events.   
      
   Although autonomous driving technologies have become a much more common   
   sight on the road in the last few years, due to the sheer number of   
   accidents these systems have caused, the way these technologies are   
   tested deserves closer scrutiny, Aksun-Guvenc said.   
      
   "Our future depends on being able to trust any and all road vehicles with   
   our safety, so all of our research concepts pertain to working towards   
   that goal," said Aksun-Guvenc, who is also co-director of Ohio State's   
   Automated Driving Lab, a research group originally formed in 2014 to   
   advance autonomous vehicle technologies.   
      
   Current approaches for demonstrating autonomous vehicle functions   
   involve testing software and technology first in simulations and then   
   on public roads.   
      
   Yet this method essentially turns other road users into involuntary   
   participants in these driving experiments, said Aksun-Guvenc, and such   
   risks can make the entire development process costly, inefficient,   
   and potentially unsafe for both drivers and pedestrians alike.   
      
   To overcome the limitations of these faulty assessments, researchers   
   in this study replaced the output of high-resolution sensors in a   
   real vehicle with simulated data to connect its controls to a highly   
   realistic 3D environment, much like giving the machine a VR headset   
   or virtual reality glasses. After feeding the data to the autonomous   
   driving system's computers and syncing the car's real motions with the   
   simulations', researchers were able to show that it behaves as if the   
   virtual environment were its true surroundings in real time.   
      
   But what makes their software especially powerful, said Levent   
   Guvenc,co-author of the study and also co-director of the Automated   
   Driving Lab, is the strength of how flexible their virtual environment   
   can be. "When actual senses are replaced by virtual senses, the model   
   can be easily changed to fit any kind of scenario," said Guvenc.   
      
   Because the VVE method can be calibrated to maintain the properties of   
   the real world while modeling rare events in the virtual environment,   
   it could easily simulate extreme traffic scenarios, like someone jumping   
   in front of a vehicle, to mundane ones like pedestrians waiting at a   
   crosswalk, he said.   
      
   Additionally, with the help of a communication app for   
   vehicle-to-pedestrian connectivity, the software can use Bluetooth to   
   communicate between a pedestrian with a mobile phone and a phone in the   
   test vehicle. The researchers had a pedestrian actually dart quickly   
   across a simulated road a safe distance from the test vehicle. But the   
   Bluetooth signal told the car that the person was darting right in front   
   of it.   
      
   "The beauty of the method is that road users can share the same   
   environment at the same time without being in the same location at all,"   
   said Guvenc. And although generating these super-realistic environments   
   can take time, he said the technological challenge of syncing different   
   environments to use in real- time simulations is one challenge their   
   team has solved.   
      
   The team has also filed a patent for the technology. In the future, Guvenc   
   said he'd also like to see it be integrated into traffic guidelines made   
   by groups such as The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.   
      
   "We could see this technology becoming a staple in the industry in   
   the next five or 10 years," said Guvenc. "That's why we're focusing on   
   building more applications for it."  Other Ohio State co-authors were   
   Xincheng Cao, Haochong Chen and Sukru Yaren Gelbal.   
      
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   Journal Reference:   
      1. Xincheng Cao, Haochong Chen, Sukru Yaren Gelbal, Bilin Aksun-Guvenc,   
         Levent Guvenc. Vehicle-in-Virtual-Environment (VVE) Method   
         for Autonomous Driving System Development, Evaluation and   
         Demonstration. Sensors, 2023; 23 (11): 5088 DOI: 10.3390/s23115088   
   ==========================================================================   
      
   Link to news story:   
   https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/07/230706124531.htm   
      
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