CAV Q&A with Cohda Wireless

Cohda Wireless joined AutonomouStuff in September for a webinar — Putting the 'C' in CAV — exploring the current state and potential of Connected Autonomous Vehicle technology. Chief Technical Officer Paul Alexander detailed how Cohda Wireless hardware and software enables vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2X) communication to give vehicle perception systems unprecedented awareness of the surrounding environment — including detection of vehicles and pedestrians not in line of sight.

Several participants posed questions during the webinar that could not be addressed due to time constraints, here follows a selection of these questions with follow-up from Paul.

Is it possible for autonomous vehicles to also broadcast their planned path in order to increase traffic flow and traffic efficiency? If not, is this something that is being looked into by Cohda Wireless and AutonomouStuff?

Intention sharing is being worked on in the standards and has existed in a basic form (speed, acceleration, radius, confidences) since the V2X standards were first drafted.

Seeing around corners — is that due to the roadside systems and other vehicles in the intersection that sent info to the vehicle around the corner?

V2X applications are designed without assuming a roadside unit is in the intersection. In typical downtown intersections, direct V2V connectivity is available 100m before the blind intersection. Seeing around corners does not require RSUs.

Can CAV detect hazardous roads? When it traveling from A to B using GPS/RSU, can it detect a detour due to road work?

Yes, vehicles can detect certain road conditions such as rain, fog, pot holes, and wheel slip (traction control events). There are standardized Traveler Information Messages (TIMs) that convey this kind of information from the road authority to the vehicle.

Many manufacturers tend to use the ROS environment to facilitate the communication between sensors and the control system. Do you consider that Cohda Wireless will implement such solution in their MK5 On Board Unit to facilitate the transfer of their messages to the control system?

The CARMA kit available through AutonomouStuff includes a ROS node that publishes information received over V2X wireless. In particular the position, speed and heading of other V2X enabled vehicles is available. This allows the host to see vehicles in non-line-of-sight scenarios such as vehicles ahead of trucks or around building corners.