MEET THE SAFE-UP PARTNERS
CEA-LETI
Who belongs to your SAFE-UP team?
CEA-LETI is involved in SAFE-UP through its wireless division, which is interested in various topics like cellular systems, the Internet of Things, antennas, propagation, and vehicular communications. CEA-LETI is mainly involved in WP3 (Active safety systems for vehicle-VRU interaction). The team includes Sylvie Mayrargue, Mouna Karoui, and Benoît Denis, all three of us with solid experience in C-ITS (Cooperative Intelligence Systems).
What does CEA bring to the project?
In WP3, Demo 4 is dedicated to evaluating the safety benefits of VRU connectivity. In particular, Demo 4 focuses on low or no visibility situations between the car and the VRU. This is precisely the case where connectivity can provide an advantage over the baseline case in which only in-vehicle radar, lidar, and cameras are used as sensors to detect a VRU at risk. Mutual awareness is achieved by the regular exchange of information among road users: vehicles or pedestrians (V2V and V2P messages) and between road users and roadside infrastructure (V2I messages). Awareness can be also achieved through message exchanges (V2N) using long-range 4G/5G networks. All these message exchanges are part of Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS).
On the one hand, the presence of the VRU can be detected by a Road Side Unit (RSU) or by a vehicle, both using their onboard sensors (camera, lidar). In this latter case, the vehicle information is sent wirelessly to the network (V2N, or to the RSU (V2I) - or possibly to both - and is then processed (fused) to enhance the probability of VRU detection. On the other hand, when connected, VRUs can also broadcast their awareness information, which is received either by the vehicles thus directly warned, or by the RSU and/or the 4G/5G network, which will in turn alert the vehicles.
CEA-LETI simulations aim to test a variety of configurations and operating contexts that could not be physically addressed in real field trials. In particular, we have performed comparisons between the above-mentioned different connectivity architectures or infrastructure deployments. We have also considered multiple radio technologies, different kinds of input sensor information and accordingly, distinct message formats to convey such information. In addition, we took advantage of the simulations to consider larger numbers of vehicles than in Demo 4 to address scalability issues.
Why did you want to take part in SAFE-UP?
Vehicular communications are part of the CEA-LETI wireless division roadmap. We have accumulated expertise in V2X communication protocols, both for short distances (IEEE 802.11p and C-V2X sidelink) and for long distances (V2N). In the context of other EU projects, we have developed several simulation tools, which have been upgraded in the context of SAFE UP, to take into account the specificities of VRUs and more realistic sensor data. Therefore, participating in SAFE UP expands our portfolio of expertise and simulators. In addition, our usual partners in EU projects are from the ICT (Information and Communication Technology) community. SAFE UP has a broader point of view, also involving mechanical engineers and accidentology researchers, thus enlarging our scope.
Which other initiatives are you involved in?
We have been involved in a number of past and present European projects on vehicular technologies, in particular H2020 HIGHTS, 5G HEART and 5G CARMEN. HIGHTS (2015-2018) was dedicated to obtaining increased localization accuracy through vehicle-to-vehicle cooperation, 5G HEART (2019- 2022) (resp. 5G CARMEN (2018-2022)) involved evaluating the improvement of vehicle safety brought by connectivity at a junction (resp. when manoeuvering on a cross-border highway). We also have been involved in the Celtic + project, where connected vehicles also carried pollution/weather sensors, and the challenge was to create crowdsourced pollution maps.
Related deliverables
D3.2 Demo 2 Vehicle demonstrator for object detection in adverse weather conditions