It's a horror scenario for any motorist: suddenly a previously invisible pedestrian emerges from the dark between two street lamps or the shadow of two parked cars. Researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) are working on a method to optimally match car headlights to local conditions using external sensors located along the road or in other vehicles.
Environment
Lighting conditions that blur the contrast between an object and its surroundings are what experts call the 'camouflage effect'. The human eye cannot perceive the object under these conditions. The same applies to camera eyes of autonomous vehicles.
The headlamp "Propix" (short for projector pixel) developed at KIT's Light Technology Institute (LTI) several years ago was the scientists' starting point for the new headlights. Propix can adapt its light distribution to the environment, i.e. completely suppress certain areas while brightly illuminating others. Now the researchers are working on connecting Propix to the car's other ultrasonic, radar or lidar (using laser radiation instead of radio waves) sensors. If the sensors detect an obstacle in an eye or camera blind spot, the headlight should autonomously react and illuminate the spot or dim the light. "By combining stationary street lighting with variable headlights, optimal visibility is achieved," says Professor Cornelius Neumann, head of LTI.
Interaction
And the goal is even more ambitious: Propix control needs to be delivered not only with information from sensors on one's own vehicle, but also from sensors on board other vehicles or along the road. "The challenge is the interaction between the various sensors and the headlights," says Neumann. Using the human body as inspiration, the scientists want to equip the car with additional sensory organs. "Regardless of whether we see a person in our path or we only hear their steps, the information is the same: someone is approaching us," explains Neumann. "If we can tune a car to this, we can make road traffic safer."
Researchers plan to test their new technology at the Baden-Württemberg Test Area for Autonomous Driving, which opened in Karlsruhe in May this year. The project OpEr (Optimisation of pedestrian visibility based on interconnected infrastructure) will therefore be one of the first research projects carried out in this area. Funding for this will be provided by the state government.
Short video explanation: in a camouflage effect, lighting conditions blur the contrast between an object and its surroundings. In traffic, this can have fatal consequences. Researchers at KIT want to increase safety by connecting headlights and street lights. The pedestrian on the left between the two street lights is barely visible. Evaluation of the interconnected sensor images allows the high-resolution headlight to adjust the light distribution and distinguish the pedestrian from the background as a negative projection. By comparison, the woman in the front right not illuminated by the smart headlight remains barely visible.
Source: KIT
Photo: Markus Breig
