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Drone platform for safety in testing - Chalmers Global Project

Company: AstaZero AB

Major(s):
Primary: CMPEN
Secondary: CMPSC

Non-Disclosure Agreement: NO

Intellectual Property: NO

AstaZero is a proving ground located deep in the forests outside Gothenburg, Sweden, built to test advanced automated driving and active safety systems in road vehicles, such as automated emergency brake systems commonly found in modern vehicles. AstaZero is a non-profit organization owned indirectly by the Swedish government and performs independent testing, verification, and certification for its customers. Previous Capstone projects at AstaZero have focused on using drones to support day-to-day operations. A previous project improved site security by detecting breaks in the fence enclosing the track with the help of AI-image analysis. In contrast, another project developed a safety system for AV testing using drones to detect vulnerable road users. AstaZero has developed an Autonomous Vehicle Test Operating System (ATOS) to carry out scenariobased testing. This system controls test participants, such as the vehicle under test, crash targets, and surrounding infrastructure. ATOS features functionality that ensures the safe and secure testing of AVs. The previously developed safety system enhances the safety of ATOS; still, interesting research questions relating to video latencies, machine-learning methods deployed on edge-compute, and real-world validation and testing of the system remain unanswered. Goal Therefore, this project's goal is to continue developing a software-based system for automated supervision of tests at the proving ground, which will be showcased at the AstaZero proving ground at the project’s end. The showcase will demonstrate a drone-control system that integrates with ATOS to plan drone routes, simultaneously using AI and machine learning-based techniques to detect, e.g., endangered persons or dangerous and/or anomalous behavior of test objects. The task Pennsylvania State University students will collaborate with Chalmers University of Technology students in this international project to reach the goal. Your task will be to design, implement, and test a system for detecting dangerous situations during testing, building upon previous students’ work. 1. Understand code and systems produced by previous students. 2. Make a plan for developing new software and integrating it with existing systems based on a gap analysis between previous systems and the system described in the goal section. 3. Integrate a drone control system with ATOS, enabling the efficient control of drones. 4. Continue development on a vulnerable road user detection method. 5. Deploy signals to ATOS in real-time.