Date: 19/03/2017
Mitsubishi uses AI to create 3D maps for self driving cars
Self driving vehicles require both in-vehicle sensors and dynamic maps. To keep the map information constantly up to date is a tough task. Mitsubishi Electric has come out with a new technology for automated-mapping and extraction of transitions in mapping landscape.
Mitsubishi Electric able to create dynamic 3D mapping using artificial intelligence (AI) software by using its own Mobile Mapping System (MMS). The 3-dimensional maps provide static information of roads and surrounding objects required for autonomous self-driving technologies. The maps are refreshed with dynamic information such as traffic signals, surrounding vehicles, and any such physical things for safe, highly precise autonomous driving.
AI powered automated mapping technology collects information such as road markings and traffic signs from laser-point clouds and camera data measured and collected by MMS. Mitsubishi Electric's MMS provides 3D positional information of roads and roadside structures with a 10cm or less accuracy. All this information is collected via a system consisting of laser scanners, cameras and GPS antennas, while driving. AI is used for improving the precision of extraction and recognition of the only data necessary, resulting in some 10 times faster map creation compared to industry-standard manual creation, as per Mitsubishi. The system also claimed by Mitsubishi as less expensive than the conventional methods.
Mitsubishi Electric generating dynamic maps early by using a different extraction technology. "By automatically extracting characteristic points of past data and the latest laser-point cloud data measured with MMS, the difference extraction technology is able to distinguish differences and changes where characteristic points do not match." quoted in Mitsubishi's release.
Due to this technology, The updating and maintenance is also done at a faster rate by automatic extraction of only the points that has changed, compared to updating the entire map each time.
Mitsubishi Electric plans to sell software utilizing this automated mapping and difference extraction technologies to map publishers including Dynamic Map Planning Corporation in the October month of 2017. The software will be used for the creation of highly precise 3D maps of expressways in Japan.
Mitsubishi to showcase this tech at event "CeBIT 2017" in Hannover, Germany happening on March 20 through March 24, 2017.
