Detailed Action
This Office Action is taken in response to Applicant’s Amendment and Remarks filed on 10/01/2025 regarding Application No. 17/979,258 originally filed on 11/02/2022. Claims 1-20 as filed are currently pending and have been considered as follows:
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Response to Arguments
The applicant argues Lee’s “framework is fundamentally vehicle-centric and pertains only to the transmission of information about the vehicle status or maneuver” and “does not contemplate generating or transmitting the real-time location of a passenger who has exited the vehicle,” particularly for preventing secondary accidents. [Remarks, pp. 8-9].
The examiner respectfully disagrees.
Lee is relied upon for teaching a minimal risk maneuver / fallback framework and transmitting a fallback situation to surrounding vehicles and control centers. (as per “The vehicle 100 may provide a notification of the performance of the minimal risk maneuver to the surrounding vehicle or surrounding facilities (e.g., infrastructure, police station, fire station, hospital, etc.)” in ¶223). Tsuge teaches detecting that an occupant who was previously inside the vehicle is present outside the vehicle after an emergency, and generating/transmitting an emergency report including location information using vehicle-mounted sensors. (as per “the vehicle outside occupant detector… perform determination as to whether an occupant… is present inside the vehicle or outside the vehicle after the occurrence of the emergency” in ¶6, as per “The vehicle outside camera 44… [enables] recognize the occupant present outside” in ¶61, as per “generate an emergency report and automatically transmit… to the operator terminal” in ¶69, as per “information on the emergency… include… a current location” in ¶117). Wolfgang further teaches localizing a person around a vehicle using vehicle sensor data and distance calculations. (as per “image data depicting the surroundings… recorded” in ¶59, as per “measuring distances… between… persons… and the vehicle” in ¶69). Katta teaches transmitting information via edge computing devices / vRSUs as an edge infrastructure communications path. (as per “vehicles… communicate to vRSUs instantiated on edge computing devices” in ¶28, as per “a transmission from a vehicle carrying a location… processed by… an edge computing device” in ¶46). Accordingly, applicant’s “Lee-only” critique is not persuasive because the escapee detection/location and edge transmission are supplied by Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta in combination with Lee.
The applicant argues that the examiner’s position amounts to “routine adaptation” without a sufficient teaching or motivation to combine and that “routine adaptation” alone is legally insufficient. [Remarks, pp. 8-13].
The examiner respectfully disagrees.
Lee teaches communicating fallback/minimal risk maneuver information to surrounding vehicles and facilities/control centers (as per ¶223). Tsuge teaches detecting an occupant outside the vehicle after an emergency and transmitting an emergency report including location information to an emergency support center (as per ¶6, ¶69, ¶117). Wolfgang teaches deriving/refining a person’s location around a vehicle using vehicle sensor data and distance calculations (as per ¶59, ¶69). Katta teaches using edge computing devices / vRSUs to communicate vehicle/infrastructure information via edge infrastructure. (as per ¶28, ¶46). It would have been obvious to combine these teachings to transmit occupant location information together with fallback/emergency information through edge infrastructure because the combination is a predictable use of known elements according to their established functions (emergency/fallback reporting, person localization, and edge-based V2X transmission).
Applicant’s arguments with respect to remaining claim(s) have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claim(s) 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee (US Pub. No. 20230399019) in view of Tsuge (US Pub. No. 20230023067) in view of Wolfgang (WO Pub. No. 2014198548) in further view of Katta (US Pub. No. 20230199449).
As per Claim 1, Lee discloses of a vehicle for performing minimal risk maneuver (as per Abstract) comprising:
an autonomous driving system controlling autonomous driving of a vehicle; (as per "a vehicle 100 may support autonomous driving. According to embodiments, the vehicle 100 can perform steering, acceleration, braking, shifting, or parking without an operation of a driver, and can be driven under the control of the driver when the driver intervenes. For example, the vehicle 100 may mean a vehicle capable of performing autonomous driving according to a level 3 or higher according to society of automation engineers (SAE). " in ¶28)
an error detection unit detecting a fallback situation; (as per "the vehicle 100 may determine whether a failure occurs in the components and functions of the vehicle 100 and the position of the failure." in ¶211)
a safety controller driving a safety process for each fallback situation when a fallback situation occurs, (as per “When the vehicle 100 performs autonomous driving, a specific event that prevents the autonomous driving from continuing may occur. When the specific event occurs, the vehicle 100 may be in a (unexpected) risk state. The minimal risk maneuver may be performed on the vehicle 100 in order to release (or relieve) such a risk state” in ¶56, as per “Referring to FIGS. 1 to 3 , a request for the minimal risk maneuver is generated (S110). According to the embodiments, the processor 130 may detect the vehicle 100 and a state around the vehicle 100, and may generate the request for the minimal risk maneuver in accordance with the detection result” in ¶72)
transmits the fallback situation to surrounding vehicles and control centers (as per “when a failure occurs in the control system, the vehicle 100 may turn on or off the hazard warning light by using lighting control or transmit an emergency message to a control center by using a communication control function (or network redundancy)” in ¶114, as per “The vehicle 100 may provide a notification of the performance of the minimal risk maneuver to the surrounding vehicle or surrounding facilities (e.g., infrastructure, police station, fire station, hospital, etc.)” in ¶223)
Lee fails to expressly disclose:
a controller interworking with an edge infrastructure when a situation occurs,
wherein, after detecting an emergency escape of a passenger from the vehicle,
the safety controller generates location information of the escaped passenger using vehicle-mounted sensors and
transmits the generated location information of the escaped passenger to control centers through the edge infrastructure.
Tsuge discloses of a vehicle with emergency reporting function, comprising:
wherein, after detecting an emergency escape of a passenger from the vehicle, (as per “The vehicle ECU 31 may collect information about the state of the occupant after the collision detection, for example, by means of the occupant monitoring device 37. The occupant can get out of the vehicle after the collision detection, or can be thrown out of the vehicle upon the collision” in ¶76, as per “The vehicle outside occupant detector is configured to perform detection that an occupant of the vehicle is present outside the vehicle. On the basis of the detection by the vehicle outside occupant detector, the processor is configured to perform determination as to whether an occupant who has been present inside the vehicle before occurrence of the emergency is present inside the vehicle or outside the vehicle after the occurrence of the emergency” in ¶6)
the safety controller generates location information using vehicle-mounted sensors (as per “The vehicle ECU 31 determines, on the basis of the detection by the vehicle inside camera 38 and the vehicle outside camera 44,” in ¶180, as per “details of the emergency report. Non-limiting examples of the details of the emergency report may include a site, i.e., a position of the automobile 2 that has made the emergency report, a report time, and a reported or predicted state about the automobile 2 and the occupant” in ¶40, as per “Non-limiting examples of the information on the emergency may include a type, a degree, an occurrence time, and a current location” in ¶117, as per “The vehicle outside camera 44 may capture an image of the outside of the vehicle, e.g., surroundings of the automobile 2. In one embodiment, the vehicle outside camera 44 may serve as a “vehicle outside occupant detector”. The vehicle outside camera 44 may be a 360-degree camera that captures an image of the entire surroundings of the automobile 2, or may be a plurality of cameras provided toward the surroundings of the automobile 2 to have angles of view differ from each other. In a case where an occupant who has got out of the automobile 2 or an occupant thrown out of the automobile 2 is present around the automobile 2, the vehicle outside camera 44 may capture an image of such an occupant present outside the vehicle. Processing a vehicle outside captured image of the vehicle outside camera 44 makes it possible to distinguish or recognize the occupant present outside the automobile 2. Note that the occupant present outside the automobile 2 may be detected by a vehicle outside occupant detector other than the vehicle outside camera 44, for example, by a radar that outputs a millimeter wave toward the surroundings of the automobile 2” in ¶61, as per “The vehicle outside calling device may include the vehicle outside camera 44 and may be capable of video calling. The vehicle outside calling device may serve as a “second calling device”. An occupant present outside the automobile 2 may use the vehicle outside speaker 45 and the vehicle outside microphone 46 for a phone call outside the vehicle” in ¶64)
transmits the generated location information to control centers; (as per “the control system 30 of the automobile 2 may make an emergency report to the operator terminal 3 of the emergency support center from the mobile communicator 33 to be described later, through the base station 6 and the communication network 7” in ¶28, as per “the vehicle ECU 31 may generate an emergency report and automatically transmit the emergency report to the operator terminal 3 via the mobile communicator 33 on the basis of the detection” in ¶69)
In this way, Tsuge operates to determine whether an occupant who has been present inside the vehicle before an emergency is present inside the vehicle or outside the vehicle after the emergency (Abstract). Like Lee, Tsuge is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee with the emergency reporting function as taught by Tsuge to enable another standard means of using vehicle mounted monitors (i.e. cameras as per ¶64) to detect an occupant outside of the vehicle (¶61), and share location of passenger (i.e. video location of occupancy, as per “The vehicle outside calling device may include the vehicle outside camera 44 and may be capable of video calling” in ¶64). In combination with Lee, such modification allows the generated location information of Tsuge to be transmitted via V2V communications, as disclosed by Lee (as per ¶223 of Lee).
Lee and Tsuge fail to expressly disclose:
a controller interworking with an edge infrastructure when a situation occurs,
the safety controller generates location information of the escaped passenger
transmits information through the edge infrastructure.
Wolfgang discloses of locating one or more persons by a vehicle, comprising:
the safety controller generates location information of the escaped passenger (as per “while the current position of vehicle 10 is determined in procedural step S02 as being within the near zone 30 which was last defined in procedural step S01, image data depicting the surroundings of vehicle 10 are automatically and continuously recorded” in ¶59, as per “measuring distances d1 , d2 between each of the detected persons 12, 14 and the vehicle 10. Additionally, a distance will be calculated between the last determined position of the person to be found 12 and the current position of the vehicle 10” in ¶69)
In this way, Wolfgang operates to localize a person using vehicle sensors (¶49-¶51, ¶91-¶92). Like Lee and Tsuge, Wolfgang is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee and the emergency reporting function of Tsuge with the locating device as taught by Wolfgang to enable another standard means of derive/confirm/refine a person’s location outside of a vehicle (as per Fig. 2).
Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang fail to expressly disclose:
a controller interworking with an edge infrastructure when a situation occurs,
transmits information through the edge infrastructure.
Katta discloses of virtualized road-side units for vehicle-to-everything communication, comprising:
a controller interworking with an edge infrastructure when a situation occurs, (as per “instead of communicating directly with RSUs via sidelink connections, vehicles and roadside infrastructure units may communicate to vRSUs instantiated on edge computing devices (e.g., Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) communication) over point-to-point cellular communications links” in ¶28, as per “an edge computing device 104 services a first vehicle 110 and a second vehicle 120 traveling on a roadway 102, as well as a roadside infrastructure unit” in ¶24)
transmits information through the edge infrastructure. (as per “a message may be generated for transmission to the vehicle, such as over a wireless cellular communication link. The message may be based upon the set of infrastructure information, and in various embodiments may be a safety message and/or an information message” in ¶13, as per “, a vehicle (such as first vehicle 110 and/or second vehicle 120) may communicate with vRSUs with which they are associated (such as vRSUs instantiated by edge computing device 104 and/or edge computing device 204), and may transmit information to the vRSUs and receive information from the associated vRSUs. A vehicle may use a cloud server at a well-known end point to get a service listing and/or a resource endpoint corresponding with a nearest edge server (e.g., an edge computing device 104 and/or edge computing device 204)” in ¶41, as per “Roadside infrastructure unit 130, which in various embodiments may include hardware for interfacing with and/or controlling one or more traffic signaling devices and/or other roadside infrastructure devices, may be in communication with (or may include) a cabinet or controller unit 140, which may have an interface to a RO network link 152 through which it is in communication with an RO Traffic Management Center (TMC) backend device 160 (e.g., a server). Edge computing device 104 and/or TMC backend device 160 may communicate over the internet with various other portions of RO network 150, such as various other remote and/or distributed edge computing devices and/or cloud computing devices of a cloud 170 of computing resources (which may include public cloud portions and/or private cloud portions)” in ¶25)
In this way, Katta operates to facilitate the provision of infrastructure information to vehicles through the use of virtualized RSUs (vRSUs) and wireless cellular communication technologies, such as fourth-generation (4G) and/or fifth-generation (5G) wireless cellular communication technologies (¶12). Like Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang, Katta is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee, the emergency reporting function of Tsuge, and the locating device of Wolfgang with the communication system as taught by Katta to enable another standard means of communicating data/information (i.e. locations of vehicles, entities, etc. as per Abstract) via edge computing devices (as per ¶59, ¶13).
As per Claim 2, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses:
wherein the safety process includes at least one of safety zone emergency stop scenario including location and movement route to a safety zone in conjunction with the edge infrastructure; (as per "Referring to FIG. 15, the vehicle 100 may stop in a safety zone when performing the minimal risk maneuver. In the present specification, the safety zone means a zone in which the vehicle 100 can safely stop among zones on the road, and may mean, for example, a rest stop, a shoulder, or a variable lane that is not in use." in ¶200)
a vehicle control scenario of autonomous driving system maintaining autonomous driving; (as per "the vehicle 100 being driven may initiate the minimal risk maneuver when the minimal risk maneuver is required. That is, the driving state S1 may be transitioned to the minimum risk maneuver state S2... In the minimum risk maneuver state S2, the vehicle 100 may perform an operation for reducing the risk of the vehicle 100." in ¶53-¶54)
an emergency stop scenario for emergency-stopping the vehicle; (as per "When a failure occurs due to inevitable extrinsic circumstances, the vehicle 100 may reduce its speed or may perform in-lane stop or (emergency) shoulder stop." in ¶96)
a driver control switching scenario in which a control right of the autonomous vehicle is switched to a driver to guide a location and route of a safety zone. (as per “if a problem of the autonomous driving function is not resolved, the vehicle 100 may perform manual driving by transferring the control authority to the driver instead of continuously maintaining the autonomous driving.” in ¶218)
As per Claim 3, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses wherein the error detection unit includes:
an operation design domain (ODD) detection module detecting a malfunction of an ODD that defines a specific operating condition of an automated driving system (ADS); (as per “The vehicle 100 may monitor the state of each of the components of the vehicle 100 in real time.” in ¶73)
a hardware detection module detecting a malfunction of hardware installed in the autonomous vehicle; (as per "The specific event may include failure of components of the vehicle 100, deviation of the vehicle 100 path, control failure of the vehicle 100." in ¶57)
a network detection module detecting a malfunction of network equipment in the autonomous vehicle; (as per "when a failure occurs in an in-vehicle network, the vehicle 100 may perform the in-lane stop or deceleration by using network redundancy. That is, even if a failure occurs in the in-vehicle network, the vehicle 100 transmits commands on the network by using previously obtained redundancy" in ¶109)
a software detection module detecting a malfunction of software by detecting an amount and type of data transmitted and received between each hardware in the autonomous driving system; (as per "The vehicle 100 may check the state of the hardware configuration and the software configuration of the vehicle 100. According to the embodiments, the vehicle 100 may determine whether a failure occurs in the components and functions of the vehicle 100..." in ¶155)
a driving detection module detecting a malfunction in at least one of longitudinal to lateral control, stop, and speed control of the vehicle as an operation of the autonomous driving system. (as per " the level 1 MRM type may be selected in the case of a lane detection failure, control failure of a lateral actuator (steering), etc." in ¶149)
As per Claim 4, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses:
wherein, when the error detection unit detects a fallback situation in which it is possible to perform autonomous driving of the autonomous driving system and to switch a control right to driver, (as per "the vehicle 100 may determine whether to give the control authority of the minimal risk maneuver to the vehicle 100 or to the driver." in ¶228)
the safety controller switches the driving control right of the autonomous driving system to a driver and establishes and outputs a response strategy including at least one of:
a set destination, (as per “The type of the minimal risk maneuver may include stopping the vehicle, controlling the steering of the vehicle, maintaining a lane, providing visual, audible and tactile notifications, decelerating the vehicle, accelerating the vehicle, and initiating/ending the autonomous driving, turning off the vehicle...” in ¶76)
a movement route to a safety zone,
information on a company that can be called in an emergency by interworking with the edge infrastructure. (as per “vehicle 100 may turn on or off the hazard warning light by using lighting control or transmit an emergency message to a control center by using a communication control function (or network redundancy).” in ¶114)
As per Claim 5, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses:
wherein, when a detection signal of a fallback situation in which autonomous driving is impossible and it is possible to switch a driving control right to a driver is received from the error detection unit, (as per "if a problem of the autonomous driving function is not resolved, the vehicle 100 may perform manual driving by transferring the control authority to the driver instead of continuously maintaining the autonomous driving." in ¶218)
the safety controller switches a driving control right of the autonomous driving system to a driver and establishes and outputs a response strategy including at least one of:
a set destination,
a route to a safety zone, (as per “"when there exists a common safety zone indicated by each of the determinations S220 to S240, the vehicle 100 may stop in the common safety zone." in ¶206, as per "the vehicle 100 determines that the safety zone exists, and travels to the common safety zone and stops" in ¶208)
information on a company that can be called in an emergency by interworking with the edge infrastructure. (as per “vehicle 100 may turn on or off the hazard warning light by using lighting control or transmit an emergency message to a control center by using a communication control function (or network redundancy).” in ¶114)
As per Claim 6, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses wherein, when the error detection unit detects a fallback situation in which it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver and it is possible to establish a fallback minimal risk condition (MRC) in the autonomous driving system, the safety controller maintains vehicle control in the autonomous driving system. (as per "When an event C1 occurs in the MRM performing step S920, a transition to a minimal risk condition (MRC) step S930 may occur. The event C1 may mean that the speed of the subject vehicle is 0, that is, the subject vehicle stops. When an event C2 occurs in the MRM performing step S920, a transition to the ADS standby or ADS off step S940 may occur. The event C2 may mean that the intervention of the driver is made while the MRM is being performed." in ¶138)
As per Claim 7, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses:
wherein, when the error detection unit detects a fallback situation in which it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver and to establish and execute a fallback MRC set in the autonomous driving system itself, (as per "The vehicle 100 may determine an entity of the control authority based on a cause that requires the minimal risk maneuver. As described above, when a specific event (e.g., risk) occurs for the vehicle 100, a request for the minimal risk maneuver may be generated. The vehicle 100 can determine the entity of the control authority based on the characteristics of the event which requests the minimal risk maneuver." in ¶229)
the safety controller requests and receives location information of a safety zone where emergency stop is possible through the edge infrastructure to move the vehicle to the safety zone (as per "The vehicle 100 may determine whether the safety zone exists or not by using navigation information (S220). According to the embodiments, the vehicle 100 may determine whether or not the safety zone exists on the road around the vehicle 100 by using the current position of the vehicle 100 and navigation information." in ¶202) and emergency-stop the vehicle by controlling the autonomous driving system. (as per “the vehicle 100 may stop in a safety zone when performing the minimal risk maneuver. In the present specification, the safety zone means a zone in which the vehicle 100 can safely stop among zones on the road, and may mean, for example, a rest stop, a shoulder, or a variable lane that is not in use.” in ¶200)
As per Claim 8, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses:
wherein, when the error detection unit detects a fallback situation in which it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver and a fallback MRC set in the autonomous driving system itself is impossible, (as per “The vehicle 100 can determine the entity of the control authority based on the characteristics of the event which requests the minimal risk maneuver." in ¶229)
and location information of a safety zone where an emergency stop is possible is not received, (as per "When the common safety zone indicated by each of the determinations S220 to S240 does not exist, the vehicle 100 may determine that there is no safety zone and continue to travel without stopping." in ¶207) the safety controller makes an emergency stop by controlling the autonomous driving system in conjunction with the edge infrastructure. (as per "When only the brake control of the vehicle 100 is possible and other control functions fail, the straight stop can be performed by controlling the brake of the vehicle 100 or by removing the driving force of the vehicle 100." in ¶81, as per "When a failure occurs due to inevitable extrinsic circumstances, the vehicle 100 may reduce its speed or may perform in-lane stop or (emergency) shoulder stop." in ¶96
As per Claim 9, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee further discloses:
wherein, when the error detection unit detects a fallback situation in which autonomous driving of the autonomous driving system is not possible and it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver, (as per “the controller 120 can control emergency braking to be operated automatically when collision is expected, etc.” in ¶43)
the safety controller emergency-stops the vehicle by controlling the autonomous driving system in conjunction with the edge infrastructure. (as per "When a failure occurs due to inevitable extrinsic circumstances, the vehicle 100 may reduce its speed or may perform in-lane stop or (emergency) shoulder stop." in ¶96)
As per Claim 10, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 8. Lee fails to expressly disclose wherein the safety controller generates location information by detecting the location of the passenger who escapes from the vehicle, and shares the location information of the passenger through the edge infrastructure.
See Claim 8 for teachings of Wolfgang. Wolfgang further discloses wherein the safety controller generates location information by detecting the location of the passenger who escapes from the vehicle. (as per “while the current position of vehicle 10 is determined in procedural step S02 as being within the near zone 30 which was last defined in procedural step S01, image data depicting the surroundings of vehicle 10 are automatically and continuously recorded” in ¶59, as per “measuring distances d1 , d2 between each of the detected persons 12, 14 and the vehicle 10. Additionally, a distance will be calculated between the last determined position of the person to be found 12 and the current position of the vehicle 10” in ¶69)
In this way, Wolfgang operates to localize a person using vehicle sensors (¶49-¶51, ¶91-¶92). Like Lee, Tsuge, and Katta, Wolfgang is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee, the emergency reporting function of Tsuge, and the communication system of Katta with the locating device as taught by Wolfgang to enable another standard means of derive/confirm/refine a person’s location outside of a vehicle (as per Fig. 2).
Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang fail to expressly disclose sharing the location information of the passenger through the edge infrastructure.
See Claim 8 for teachings of Katta. Katta further discloses sharing the location information of the passenger through the edge infrastructure. (as per “a message may be generated for transmission to the vehicle, such as over a wireless cellular communication link. The message may be based upon the set of infrastructure information, and in various embodiments may be a safety message and/or an information message” in ¶13, as per “Processors 540 may generate, based upon the subscription of the vehicle to the identifier, a message for transmission to the vehicle over the wireless cellular communication link, the message being based upon the set of infrastructure information” in ¶59)
In this way, Katta operates to facilitate the provision of infrastructure information to vehicles through the use of virtualized RSUs (vRSUs) and wireless cellular communication technologies, such as fourth-generation (4G) and/or fifth-generation (5G) wireless cellular communication technologies (¶12). Like Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang, Katta is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee, the emergency reporting function of Tsuge, and the locating device of Wolfgang with the communication system as taught by Katta to enable another standard means of communicating data/information (i.e. locations of vehicles, entities, etc. as per Abstract) via edge computing devices (as per ¶59, ¶13).
As per Claim 11, Lee discloses of a vehicle for performing minimal risk maneuver (as per Abstract) comprising:
controlling an autonomous vehicle in an autonomous driving system; (as per "a vehicle 100 may support autonomous driving. According to embodiments, the vehicle 100 can perform steering, acceleration, braking, shifting, or parking without an operation of a driver, and can be driven under the control of the driver when the driver intervenes. For example, the vehicle 100 may mean a vehicle capable of performing autonomous driving according to a level 3 or higher according to society of automation engineers (SAE). " in ¶28)
detecting a fallback situation during autonomous driving; (as per "the vehicle 100 may determine whether a failure occurs in the components and functions of the vehicle 100 and the position of the failure." in ¶211)
selecting any one of a plurality of scenarios set for fallback situations, (as per "vehicle 100 may determine whether to perform the minimal risk maneuver (S230). According to the embodiments, the vehicle 100 may determine whether to perform the minimal risk maneuver based on the determined state of the vehicle 100." in ¶212, as per "vehicle 100 may communicate with another vehicle (vehicle to vehicle) or with an infrastructure (vehicle to infrastructure) by using the communication circuit 150." in ¶49) and performing a safety process according to the selected scenario, (as per "vehicle 100 may determine whether to perform the minimal risk maneuver (S230). According to the embodiments, the vehicle 100 may determine whether to perform the minimal risk maneuver based on the determined state of the vehicle 100." in ¶212)
transmitting the fallback situation to surrounding vehicles and control centers; (as per “when a failure occurs in the control system, the vehicle 100 may turn on or off the hazard warning light by using lighting control or transmit an emergency message to a control center by using a communication control function (or network redundancy)” in ¶114, as per “The vehicle 100 may provide a notification of the performance of the minimal risk maneuver to the surrounding vehicle or surrounding facilities (e.g., infrastructure, police station, fire station, hospital, etc.)” in ¶223)
Lee fails to expressly disclose:
wherein, after detecting an emergency escape of a passenger from the vehicle,
the safety process includes generating location information of the escaped passenger using vehicle-mounted sensors and
transmitting the generated location information of the escaped passenger to control centers through the edge infrastructure.
Tsuge discloses of a vehicle with emergency reporting function, comprising:
wherein, after detecting an emergency escape of a passenger from the vehicle, (as per “The vehicle ECU 31 may collect information about the state of the occupant after the collision detection, for example, by means of the occupant monitoring device 37. The occupant can get out of the vehicle after the collision detection, or can be thrown out of the vehicle upon the collision” in ¶76, as per “The vehicle outside occupant detector is configured to perform detection that an occupant of the vehicle is present outside the vehicle. On the basis of the detection by the vehicle outside occupant detector, the processor is configured to perform determination as to whether an occupant who has been present inside the vehicle before occurrence of the emergency is present inside the vehicle or outside the vehicle after the occurrence of the emergency” in ¶6)
the safety process includes generating location information using vehicle-mounted sensors (as per “The vehicle ECU 31 determines, on the basis of the detection by the vehicle inside camera 38 and the vehicle outside camera 44,” in ¶180, as per “details of the emergency report. Non-limiting examples of the details of the emergency report may include a site, i.e., a position of the automobile 2 that has made the emergency report, a report time, and a reported or predicted state about the automobile 2 and the occupant” in ¶40, as per “Non-limiting examples of the information on the emergency may include a type, a degree, an occurrence time, and a current location” in ¶117, as per “The vehicle outside camera 44 may capture an image of the outside of the vehicle, e.g., surroundings of the automobile 2. In one embodiment, the vehicle outside camera 44 may serve as a “vehicle outside occupant detector”. The vehicle outside camera 44 may be a 360-degree camera that captures an image of the entire surroundings of the automobile 2, or may be a plurality of cameras provided toward the surroundings of the automobile 2 to have angles of view differ from each other. In a case where an occupant who has got out of the automobile 2 or an occupant thrown out of the automobile 2 is present around the automobile 2, the vehicle outside camera 44 may capture an image of such an occupant present outside the vehicle. Processing a vehicle outside captured image of the vehicle outside camera 44 makes it possible to distinguish or recognize the occupant present outside the automobile 2. Note that the occupant present outside the automobile 2 may be detected by a vehicle outside occupant detector other than the vehicle outside camera 44, for example, by a radar that outputs a millimeter wave toward the surroundings of the automobile 2” in ¶61, as per “The vehicle outside calling device may include the vehicle outside camera 44 and may be capable of video calling. The vehicle outside calling device may serve as a “second calling device”. An occupant present outside the automobile 2 may use the vehicle outside speaker 45 and the vehicle outside microphone 46 for a phone call outside the vehicle” in ¶64)
transmitting the generated location information to control centers (as per “the control system 30 of the automobile 2 may make an emergency report to the operator terminal 3 of the emergency support center from the mobile communicator 33 to be described later, through the base station 6 and the communication network 7” in ¶28, as per “the vehicle ECU 31 may generate an emergency report and automatically transmit the emergency report to the operator terminal 3 via the mobile communicator 33 on the basis of the detection” in ¶69)
In this way, Tsuge operates to determine whether an occupant who has been present inside the vehicle before an emergency is present inside the vehicle or outside the vehicle after the emergency (Abstract). Like Lee, Tsuge is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee with the emergency reporting function as taught by Tsuge to enable another standard means of using vehicle mounted monitors (i.e. cameras as per ¶64) to detect an occupant outside of the vehicle (¶61), and share location of passenger (i.e. video location of occupancy, as per “The vehicle outside calling device may include the vehicle outside camera 44 and may be capable of video calling” in ¶64). In combination with Lee, such modification allows the generated location information of Tsuge to be transmitted via V2V communications, as disclosed by Lee (as per ¶223 of Lee).
Lee and Tsuge fail to expressly disclose:
generating location information of the escaped passenger
transmitting information through the edge infrastructure.
Wolfgang discloses of locating one or more persons by a vehicle, comprising:
generating location information of the escaped passenger (as per “while the current position of vehicle 10 is determined in procedural step S02 as being within the near zone 30 which was last defined in procedural step S01, image data depicting the surroundings of vehicle 10 are automatically and continuously recorded” in ¶59, as per “measuring distances d1 , d2 between each of the detected persons 12, 14 and the vehicle 10. Additionally, a distance will be calculated between the last determined position of the person to be found 12 and the current position of the vehicle 10” in ¶69)
In this way, Wolfgang operates to localize a person using vehicle sensors (¶49-¶51, ¶91-¶92). Like Lee and Tsuge, Wolfgang is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee and the emergency reporting function of Tsuge with the locating device as taught by Wolfgang to enable another standard means of derive/confirm/refine a person’s location outside of a vehicle (as per Fig. 2).
Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang fail to expressly disclose:
transmitting information through the edge infrastructure.
Katta discloses of virtualized road-side units for vehicle-to-everything communication, comprising:
transmitting information through the edge infrastructure. (as per “a message may be generated for transmission to the vehicle, such as over a wireless cellular communication link. The message may be based upon the set of infrastructure information, and in various embodiments may be a safety message and/or an information message” in ¶13, as per “Processors 540 may generate, based upon the subscription of the vehicle to the identifier, a message for transmission to the vehicle over the wireless cellular communication link, the message being based upon the set of infrastructure information” in ¶59)
In this way, Katta operates to facilitate the provision of infrastructure information to vehicles through the use of virtualized RSUs (vRSUs) and wireless cellular communication technologies, such as fourth-generation (4G) and/or fifth-generation (5G) wireless cellular communication technologies (¶12). Like Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang, Katta is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee, the emergency reporting function of Tsuge, and the locating device of Wolfgang with the communication system as taught by Katta to enable another standard means of communicating data/information (i.e. locations of vehicles, entities, etc. as per Abstract) via edge computing devices (as per ¶59, ¶13).
As per Claim 12, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 11. Lee further discloses wherein, in the detecting, a fallback situation is detected through whether at least one of an
operation design domain (ODD), (as per ¶59)
hardware, (as per "The specific event may include failure of components of the vehicle 100, deviation of the vehicle 100 path, control failure of the vehicle 100." in ¶57)
software, (as per "The vehicle 100 may check the state of the hardware configuration and the software configuration of the vehicle 100. According to the embodiments, the vehicle 100 may determine whether a failure occurs in the components and functions of the vehicle 100..." in ¶155)
network, (as per "when a failure occurs in an in-vehicle network, the vehicle 100 may perform the in-lane stop or deceleration by using network redundancy. That is, even if a failure occurs in the in-vehicle network, the vehicle 100 transmits commands on the network by using previously obtained redundancy" in ¶109)
vehicle control device, autonomous driving function operates. (as per " the level 1 MRM type may be selected in the case of a lane detection failure, control failure of a lateral actuator (steering), etc." in ¶149)
As per Claim 13, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 11. Lee further discloses wherein the selecting includes:
when a fallback situation is detected in which it is possible to perform autonomous driving of the autonomous driving system and to switch a control right to driver in the detecting, switching the driving control right of the autonomous driving system to a driver; (as per "The vehicle 100 may determine an entity of the control authority based on a cause that requires the minimal risk maneuver. As described above, when a specific event (e.g., risk) occurs for the vehicle 100, a request for the minimal risk maneuver may be generated. The vehicle 100 can determine the entity of the control authority based on the characteristics of the event which requests the minimal risk maneuver." in ¶229)
establishing and outputting a response strategy including at least one of a set destination, (as per “The type of the minimal risk maneuver may include stopping the vehicle, controlling the steering of the vehicle, maintaining a lane, providing visual, audible and tactile notifications, decelerating the vehicle, accelerating the vehicle, and initiating/ending the autonomous driving, turning off the vehicle...” in ¶76) a movement route to a safety zone, and information on a company that can be called in an emergency by interworking with the edge infrastructure. (as per “vehicle 100 may turn on or off the hazard warning light by using lighting control or transmit an emergency message to a control center by using a communication control function (or network redundancy).” in ¶114)
As per Claim 14, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 11. Lee further discloses wherein the selecting includes:
when a fallback situation is detected in which autonomous driving is impossible and it is possible to switch a driving control right to a driver in the detecting, switching a driving control right of the autonomous driving system to a driver; (as per "if a problem of the autonomous driving function is not resolved, the vehicle 100 may perform manual driving by transferring the control authority to the driver instead of continuously maintaining the autonomous driving." in ¶218)
establishing and outputting a response strategy including at least one of a set destination, a movement route to a safety zone (as per “"when there exists a common safety zone indicated by each of the determinations S220 to S240, the vehicle 100 may stop in the common safety zone." in ¶206, as per "the vehicle 100 determines that the safety zone exists, and travels to the common safety zone and stops" in ¶208), and information on a company that can be called in an emergency by interworking with the edge infrastructure. (as per “vehicle 100 may turn on or off the hazard warning light by using lighting control or transmit an emergency message to a control center by using a communication control function (or network redundancy).” in ¶114)
As per Claim 15, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 11. Lee further discloses wherein the selecting further includes when a fallback situation is detected in which it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver and it is possible to establish a fallback minimal risk condition (MRC) in the autonomous driving system in the detecting, maintain vehicle control in the autonomous driving system by receiving sensed information from front and rear vehicles through the edge infrastructure. (as per "When an event C1 occurs in the MRM performing step S920, a transition to a minimal risk condition (MRC) step S930 may occur. The event C1 may mean that the speed of the subject vehicle is 0, that is, the subject vehicle stops. When an event C2 occurs in the MRM performing step S920, a transition to the ADS standby or ADS off step S940 may occur. The event C2 may mean that the intervention of the driver is made while the MRM is being performed." in ¶138)
As per Claim 16, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 11. Lee further discloses wherein the selecting includes:
when a fallback situation is detected in which it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver and to establish and execute a fallback MRC set in the autonomous driving system itself in the detecting, (as per "The vehicle 100 may determine an entity of the control authority based on a cause that requires the minimal risk maneuver. As described above, when a specific event (e.g., risk) occurs for the vehicle 100, a request for the minimal risk maneuver may be generated. The vehicle 100 can determine the entity of the control authority based on the characteristics of the event which requests the minimal risk maneuver." in ¶229)
requesting and receiving location information of a safety zone where emergency stop is possible through the edge infrastructure; (as per "The vehicle 100 may determine whether the safety zone exists or not by using navigation information (S220). According to the embodiments, the vehicle 100 may determine whether or not the safety zone exists on the road around the vehicle 100 by using the current position of the vehicle 100 and navigation information." in ¶202)
controlling the autonomous driving system to move to a safety zone received through the edge infrastructure and making an emergency stop in the safety zone. (as per “the vehicle 100 may stop in a safety zone when performing the minimal risk maneuver. In the present specification, the safety zone means a zone in which the vehicle 100 can safely stop among zones on the road, and may mean, for example, a rest stop, a shoulder, or a variable lane that is not in use.” in ¶200)
As per Claim 17, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 11. Lee further discloses wherein the selecting includes:
when a fallback situation is detected in which it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver and a fallback MRC set in the autonomous driving system itself is impossible in the detecting, searching for a location of a safety zone in which emergency stop is possible through the edge infrastructure and self-sensing; (as per “The vehicle 100 can determine the entity of the control authority based on the characteristics of the event which requests the minimal risk maneuver." in ¶229)
when the safety zone in which emergency stop is possible cannot be found (as per "When the common safety zone indicated by each of the determinations S220 to S240 does not exist, the vehicle 100 may determine that there is no safety zone and continue to travel without stopping." in ¶207), controlling and emergency-stopping the autonomous driving system by interworking with the edge infrastructure. (as per "When only the brake control of the vehicle 100 is possible and other control functions fail, the straight stop can be performed by controlling the brake of the vehicle 100 or by removing the driving force of the vehicle 100." in ¶81, as per "When a failure occurs due to inevitable extrinsic circumstances, the vehicle 100 may reduce its speed or may perform in-lane stop or (emergency) shoulder stop." in ¶96)
As per Claim 18, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 11. Lee further discloses wherein the selecting includes:
when a fallback situation is detected in which autonomous driving of the autonomous driving system is not possible and it is impossible to switch a driving control right to a driver in the detecting; (as per “the controller 120 can control emergency braking to be operated automatically when collision is expected, etc.” in ¶43)
emergency-stopping the vehicle by controlling the autonomous driving system in conjunction with the edge infrastructure. (as per "When a failure occurs due to inevitable extrinsic circumstances, the vehicle 100 may reduce its speed or may perform in-lane stop or (emergency) shoulder stop." in ¶96)
As per Claim 19, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 17. Lee fails to expressly disclose wherein the selecting includes:
generating location information by detecting a location of a passenger who escapes to the outside of the vehicle, and
sharing the location information of the passenger through the edge infrastructure.
See Claim 17 for teachings of Wolfgang. Wolfgang further discloses:
generating location information by detecting a location of a passenger who escapes to the outside of the vehicle, and (as per “while the current position of vehicle 10 is determined in procedural step S02 as being within the near zone 30 which was last defined in procedural step S01, image data depicting the surroundings of vehicle 10 are automatically and continuously recorded” in ¶59, as per “measuring distances d1 , d2 between each of the detected persons 12, 14 and the vehicle 10. Additionally, a distance will be calculated between the last determined position of the person to be found 12 and the current position of the vehicle 10” in ¶69)
In this way, Wolfgang operates to localize a person using vehicle sensors (¶49-¶51, ¶91-¶92). Like Lee, Tsuge, and Katta, Wolfgang is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee, the emergency reporting function of Tsuge, and the communication system of Katta with the locating device as taught by Wolfgang to enable another standard means of derive/confirm/refine a person’s location outside of a vehicle (as per Fig. 2).
Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang fail to expressly disclose sharing the location information of the passenger through the edge infrastructure.
See Claim 17 for teachings of Katta. Katta further discloses sharing the location information of the passenger through the edge infrastructure. (as per “a message may be generated for transmission to the vehicle, such as over a wireless cellular communication link. The message may be based upon the set of infrastructure information, and in various embodiments may be a safety message and/or an information message” in ¶13, as per “Processors 540 may generate, based upon the subscription of the vehicle to the identifier, a message for transmission to the vehicle over the wireless cellular communication link, the message being based upon the set of infrastructure information” in ¶59)
In this way, Katta operates to facilitate the provision of infrastructure information to vehicles through the use of virtualized RSUs (vRSUs) and wireless cellular communication technologies, such as fourth-generation (4G) and/or fifth-generation (5G) wireless cellular communication technologies (¶12). Like Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang, Katta is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee, the emergency reporting function of Tsuge, and the locating device of Wolfgang with the communication system as taught by Katta to enable another standard means of communicating data/information (i.e. locations of vehicles, entities, etc. as per Abstract) via edge computing devices (as per ¶59, ¶13).
As per Claim 20, the combination of Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang, and Katta teaches or suggests all limitations of Claim 1. Lee, Tsuge, Wolfgang fail to expressly disclose wherein the location information of the passenger who escapes from the vehicle is obtained through the edge infrastructure.
See Claim 1 for teachings of Katta. Katta further discloses wherein the location information of the passenger who escapes from the vehicle is obtained through the edge infrastructure. (as per “above may be addressed by methods of virtualizing RSUs, in which a point-to-point connection may be established between a computing device and a vehicle over an interface for a wireless cellular communication link (e.g., an interface of an edge computing device to such a link). A transmission from the vehicle carrying a set of location information of the vehicle may be processed, and the vehicle may be associated with an identifier based at least in part upon the set of location information” in ¶14, as per “a transmission from a vehicle carrying a location of the vehicle may be processed by a computing device, such as an edge computing device (e.g., edge computing device 104 and/or edge computing device 204)” in ¶46, as per “carrying a set of location information of the vehicle (such as a transmission received by the wireless cellular communication link and provided to processors 540). Processors 540 may associate a vehicle with an identifier, via a location service of the system (e.g., location service 224), the identifier being based at least in part upon the set of location information of the vehicle” in ¶59)
In this way, Katta operates to facilitate the provision of infrastructure information to vehicles through the use of virtualized RSUs (vRSUs) and wireless cellular communication technologies, such as fourth-generation (4G) and/or fifth-generation (5G) wireless cellular communication technologies (¶12). Like Lee, Tsuge, and Wolfgang, Katta is concerned with vehicles.
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have modified the minimal risk maneuver system of Lee, the emergency reporting function of Tsuge, and the locating device of Wolfgang with the communication system as taught by Katta to enable another standard means of communicating data/information (i.e. locations of vehicles, entities, etc. as per Abstract) via edge computing devices (as per ¶59, ¶13).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Koravadi (US Pub. No. 20150251599) discloses a vehicle alert system utilizing communication system.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to TYLER R ROBARGE whose telephone number is (703)756-5872. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 8:00 am - 5:00 pm EST.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Ramón Mercado can be reached at (571) 270-5744. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/T.R.R./Examiner, Art Unit 3658
/TRUC M DO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3658