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 .
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 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.
Introduction
Claims 1-20 are pending and have been examined in this Office Action. This is the First Office Action on the Merits.
Examiner’s Note
Examiner has cited particular paragraphs / columns and line numbers or figures in the references as applied to the claims below for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested from the applicant, in preparing the responses, to fully consider the references in their entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner. Applicant is reminded that the Examiner is entitled to give the broadest reasonable interpretation to the language of the claims. Furthermore, the Examiner is not limited to Applicants' definition which is not specifically set forth in the disclosure.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
Claim(s) 1-4, 6, 8-11, 13, 15-18, and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. Patent Application Publication 2016/0185388 to Sim in view of U.S. Patent Application Publication 2021/0300371 to Sindhuja et al.
As per claim 1, Sim discloses an autonomous vehicle (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 13) comprising:
one or more sensors configured to detect data relating to an environment surrounding the autonomous vehicle and at least one object included within the environment (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 33 and 34); and
at least one autonomy computing system in communication with the one or more sensors, the at least one autonomy computing system comprising at least one processor in communication with at least one memory device (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 15; One in the art would understand that the device inherently has to have a processor and memory in order to detect objects and control the vehicle), and the at least one processor is programmed to:
calculate a drivable space consumption (DSC) ratio for the autonomous vehicle traveling within the environment based on an anticipated spatial occupancy for the autonomous vehicle within the environment and a drivable space within the environment (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 100 and figure 3A; The vehicle calculates a ratio of the width of the vehicle [anticipated spatial occupancy] and the interval [drivable space within the environment]);
determine a risk level for the autonomous vehicle based on the determined DSC ratio (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 100; if the interval is less than the vehicle width (or multiple of), then the risk is determined to be high); and
Sim discloses adjust driving characteristics for the autonomous vehicle traveling in the environment in response to the determined risk level for the autonomous vehicle (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 100).
It would be obvious that the vehicle in Sim would adjust the driving characteristics, i.e., velocity and acceleration, in a high-risk driving condition so that the vehicle does not collide with the forward vehicle (Sim; At least figures 2 and 3A), but Sim does not explicitly disclose this, i.e., including a high-risk driving condition.
However, Sindhuja discloses the including a high-risk driving condition (Sindhuja; At least figure 7). Sindhuja teaches that when the speed of the vehicle is higher than the speed of the forward vehicle and the lane change cannot be made (i.e., high-risk driving condition), then the vehicle must adjust velocity and acceleration to slow down. At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Sindhuja into the invention of Sim with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of using a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way with predictable results. Slowing the vehicle in the high-risk driving condition would avoid a collision and save injury, cost, etc.
As per claim 2, Sim discloses wherein the at least one processor of the at least one autonomy computing system is further programed to:
determine the autonomous vehicle is in the high-risk driving condition in response to the calculated DSC ratio being equal to or greater than a threshold (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 100; if the ratio of vehicle width to interval is above a threshold, the risk is deemed high); and
determine the autonomous vehicle is in a low-risk driving condition in response to the calculated DSC ratio being less than the threshold (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 100; if the ratio of vehicle width to interval is below a threshold, the risk is deemed low).
As per claim 3, Sim discloses wherein the at least one processor of the at least one autonomy computing system is further programed to:
maintain the driving characteristics of the autonomous vehicle traveling in the environment in response to the determined risk level for the autonomous vehicle includes the low-risk driving condition (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 78; in a low-risk condition, the velocity and acceleration are maintained).
As per claim 4, Sim discloses wherein the at least one processor of the at least one autonomy computing system is further programed to:
analyze the driving characteristics for the autonomous vehicle in response to the determined risk level for the autonomous vehicle including the high-risk driving condition (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 14);
analyze the detected data relating to the environment surrounding the autonomous vehicle and the at least one object included within the environment in response to the determined risk level for the autonomous vehicle including the high-risk driving condition (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 35); and
adjust future driving characteristics for the autonomous vehicle based on the analyzed driving characteristics for the autonomous vehicle and the analyzed detected data relating to the environment and the at least one object (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 35 and 100, and in view of Sindhuja above, the vehicle would adjust the velocity and acceleration in the future if the driving condition is high-risk and the distance to the forward vehicle is low).
As per claim 6, Sim discloses wherein the at least one processor of the at least one autonomy computing system calculate the DSC ratio for the autonomous vehicle by:
defining the anticipated spatial occupancy for the autonomous vehicle within the environment (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 100);
computing the drivable space within the environment based on the data generated by the one or more sensors of the autonomous vehicle (Sim; At least figure 3A); and
calculating the DSC ratio based on the defined, anticipated spatial occupancy for the autonomous vehicle within the environment and the computed drivable space within the environment (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 100).
As per claims 8-11 and 13, and 15-18 and 20, Sim discloses the storage medium and method of the vehicle of claims 1-4 and 6 (Sim; At least paragraph(s) 13; the device inherently has to have a storage medium to store the control program). Therefore, claims 8-11 and 13, and 15-18 and 20 are rejected using the same citations and reasoning as applied to claims 1-4 and 6.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5, 7, 12, 14, and 19 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. See PTO-892. The prior art shows the state of the art.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DAVID P MERLINO whose telephone number is (571)272-8362. The examiner can normally be reached M-Th 5:30am-3:00pm F 5:30-9:00 am ET.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Erin Bishop can be reached at 571-270-3713. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/David P. Merlino/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3665