Autonomous Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) Decision Making in Roundabout using Game Theory

Roundabout intersections promote a continuous flow of traffic. Roundabouts entry move traffic through an intersection more quickly, and with less congestion on approaching roads. With the introduction of smart vehicles and cooperative decision-making, roundabout management shortens the waiting time and leads to a more efficient traffic without breaking the traffic laws and earning penalties. This paper proposes a novel approach of cooperative behavior strategy in conflict situations between the autonomous vehicles in roundabout using game theory. The game theory presents a strategic decision-making technique between independent agents players. Each individual player tends to achieve best payoff, by analyzing possible actions of other players and their influence on game outcome. The Prisoner's Dilemma game strategy is selected as approach to autonomous vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) decision making at roundabout test-bed, because the commonly known traffic laws dictate certain rules of vehicle's behavior at roundabout. It is shown that, by integrating non-zero-sum game theory in autonomous vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) decision making capabilities, the roundabout entry problem can be solved efficiently with shortened waiting times for individual autonomous vehicles. Keywords—autonomous vehicles; decision making; non-zerosum game theory; mobile robots; roundabout; vehicle-to-vehicle cooperation (V2V); wireless communication