Vehicle Control and Information Systems for Safe Driving

OVERVIEW: Recently, there has been an increase in the practical application of ACC (adaptive cruise control) systems, which measure the following distance to the preceding vehicle by radar and automatically maintain an appropriate following distance, and lane keeping systems, which recognize lanes using vision sensors and keep the vehicle from deviating from the lane. Current systems are based on the premise of highway driving, but in the future, we can expect that these systems will come to be used on regular roads as well, in pursuit of even greater safety and comfort. Achieving this goal will require advancements in various related fields, including: (1) technologies for accurately recognizing the environment surrounding the vehicle; (2) technologies for controlling the vehicle’s speed by controlling engine, transmission, and brake operations; and (3) technologies for controlling vehicle dynamics. In “vehicle dynamics control,” driving dynamics information is passed between various components via an onboard network. Services are gradually being developed to analyze and utilize this driving dynamics information based on ITs (see Fig. 1). Hitachi, Ltd. is developing three types of sensor technologies for recognizing the conditions around the vehicle: millimeter wave radar, vision sensors, and sensor fusion. The company is also developing technologies for controlling the vehicle’s movements, as well as driving recorder technologies for analyzing vehicle dynamics control information (physical values recorded in the driving recorder that express the vehicle’s behavior) and diagnosing driving conditions and drivers’ characteristics, and services that apply these technologies. Hiroshi Kuroda Kazuaki Takano Nobuyuki Ueki Hiroshi Kondoh, Dr. Eng.