Over 6.4 million automotive accidents occur in the US annually. Odds of someone being in an accident this year are 1 chance in 16. Any information that warns of problems along the road(s) ahead can therefore potentially save lives and reduce the frequency and/or intensity of accidents. The vehicle of tomorrow is the programmable-networked vehicle. In our view, the networked vehicle of the future is one of the most complex Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) with active trajectory control, active navigation and on-line maintenance. V2V wireless networks are a special class of networked-CPS where the maximum relative speeds are in excess of 80m/s, the node density can span over 9,000 vehicles/mi^2 and, most importantly, the dynamics of the vehicle, the environment, driver reaction and interaction with other vehicles need to be considered in every communication and control decision. To meet these timeliness and coordinated communication requirements, we are developing a new set of networking capabilities that can lay the foundation for dynamic vehicular networks designed to make driving safer, more efficient and more enjoyable. This project is aimed at the design, analysis, implementation and evaluation of vehicular networks that will enable a wide range of applications including V2V and V2I communication for: (a) Bounded-latency broadcast protocols for active networked safety alerts (b) Protocols and algorithms for Real-Time collision avoidance (c) Native protocols for secure V2V and V2I communication. Real-time research in V2V networks will be the first step toward developing a Spatio-Temporal Real-Time theory and network protocols with wide-area time synchronization.
Laptop computers, smartphones and tablets communicate wirelessly using technologies like WiFi to obtain and transmit information for applications such as email, web browsing and electronic commerce. Modern cars are equipped with a few tens of microcomputers to control functions like fuel injection, transmission control, anti-lock braking, cruise control, radio/bluetooth functions and the like. If WiFi-like wireless communication technologies are added to automobiles, this capability will enable cars to communicate digitally and wirelessly with one another on the roads and with the road infrastructure. Three application families are rapidly enabled by such on-road communication capabilities: (a) safety applications wherein cars can warn each other about hard braking, accidents and slippery spots thereby preventing additional collisions and resulting injuries or even fatalities (b) tranffic management applications where information about congestion can be transmitted from vehicle to vehicle to vehicle such that real-time traffic conditions can be communicated to surrounding neighborhoods allowing navigation systems to re-route dynamically around traffic hotspots (c) social networking applications which can enable cars to download videos, podcasts and music while fueling at a gas station, and allow drivers to communicate with those of neighboring vehicles to obtain any helpful information safely. DSRC (Dedicated Short-Range Communications) is a WiFi-like technology that enables such vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) communications to enable a variety of safety, traffic management and social networking applications for use by transportation platforms. Our protocols significantly enhance throughput without affecting safety. For example, with our Maximum Progression Intersection Protocol (MP-IP) used to coordinate the traffic through roundabouts, we are able to reduce the delays up to 75.88% comparing to various signalized intersections. Our spatio-temporal intersection protocols (ST-IP) perform even better since they allow vehicles to slow down when appropriate and do not have to a complete stop. We have integrated our V2V (vehicle-to-vehicle) as well as V2I (vehicle-to-infrastructure) protocols into the fully functional autonomous vehicle developed by the PI's group at Carnegie Mellon University.. With V2V communications, the autonomous vehicle can follow other vehicles, and can also communicate with appropriately instrumented traffic lights to traverse through them just like humans can. We currently utilize a 11-lights testbed that we have outside the city of Pittburgh in the township of Cranberry. Our hybrid emulator/simulator for vehicular networks called AutoSim is now used by multiple groups including a group in South Korea. In this project, we have studied DSRC communication capabilities to enable real-time networking among vehicles, and between vehicles and infrastructural elements like traffic lights. We have built, distributed and supported powerful simulators called GrooveNet (Geographical Routing for Vehicular Networks) and AutoSim that allow the simulation of large networks of vehicles on real-word roadmaps, as well as the integration of a small fleet of real vehicles to communicate on the roads with these simulated vehicles. This allows us to validate our communication technologies "at scale" without the resources required to coordinated hundreds or thousands of vehicles. Our results are very promising. The project's principal investigator has even been chosen to be on the Scientific Advisory Board for Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) for the US Department of Transportation (US-DOT) by the Secretary of US-DOT. THis committee is referred to as the ITS Program Advisory Council (ITS-PAC).
