A Local Environment Model Based on Multi-Sensor Perception for Intelligent Vehicles

Accurate perception of the driving environment is a key technology for intelligent vehicles. Given some critical problems such as low robustness, low detection precision, difficulty in actual deployment, we propose a local environment model (LEM) based on multi-sensor fusion technology through Lidar, millimeter-wave (MMW) radar, camera, and ultrasonic radar. The local environment model mainly consists of the drivable area and the dynamic target list. The drivable area is extracted by the ground gradient threshold algorithm. Based on it, we propose an effective trim algorithm to make the drivable area model more practical. Furthermore, low-cost ultrasonic radars are deployed to compensate for the blind area of Lidar. The dynamic target list is established by local tracking and global tracking in the forward area. Kalman filter and converted measurement Kalman filter (CMKF) are adopted in the local tracking of Lidar, camera, and MMW radar. In the global tracking, the global nearest neighbor (GNN) algorithm is used for data association and the optimal distributed estimation fusion (ODEF) algorithm is used for sensor fusion. To improve the robustness of tracking, we use an assignment method to better exploit sensor performance. Finally, the vehicle experiment is carried out in the campus environment. Experimental results indicate that the proposed algorithm can avoid the false detection of the drivable area and realize real-time multi-target dynamic tracking. Therefore, the robustness and accuracy of the local environment model is verified.