Time of flight between two or more ultrasonic transceivers is measured using known delays between receiving a trigger and sending an ultrasonic pulse in reply. A receive time is measured from a beginning of a receive phase in which the pulse is detected until receipt of an ultrasonic reply pulse. A trip time is determined from a sum of the receive time and a difference between a known first reference period for a transceiver that sends the trigger pulse and a second know reference period for a second transceiver that sends the reply pulse. The second reference period corresponds to a delay between when the second transceiver receives the initial or subsequent trigger pulse from the first transceiver and when the second transceiver sends the reply pulse.

A tracking system includes a first device and a second device. The second device comprises an optical module, an ultrasonic module and a processor. The optical module is configured to capture image data in a first detection field. The ultrasonic module is configured to collect ultrasonic data in a second detection field different from the first detection field. The processor is configured to determine a relative position of a target device relative to the tracking device in a third detection field according to the image data and the ultrasonic data. The third detection field is larger than the first detection field and larger than the second detection field.

A device comprises a processor communicatively coupled with an ultrasonic sensor which is configured to repeatedly emit ultrasonic pulses during transmit periods which are interspersed with receive periods. Returned ultrasonic signals corresponding to the emitted ultrasonic pulses are received by the ultrasonic sensor during the receive periods. The processor is configured to direct the ultrasonic sensor to listen, during a listening window, for a potentially interfering ultrasonic signal from a second ultrasonic sensor. The listening window is prior to a transmit period of the transmit periods. In response to detecting the potentially interfering ultrasonic signal during the listening window, the processor is configured to adjust operation of the ultrasonic sensor to avoid an ultrasonic collision with the second ultrasonic sensor to facilitate coexistence of the ultrasonic sensor and the second ultrasonic sensor in an operating environment shared by the ultrasonic sensor and the second ultrasonic sensor.

A system for detecting objects using ultrasonic waves and methods for making and using the same are provided. The object detection system uniquely encodes each of a plurality of ultrasonic waves and transmit each of the uniquely-encoded ultrasonic waves in a respective direction. The object detection system then receives any of the emitted uniquely-encoded ultrasonic waves that are reflected from an object. By decoding the reflected ultrasonic waves, the object detection system distinguishes among the uniquely-encoded ultrasonic waves and detect the existence and location of the object.

A system for tracking wearable user devices is provided herein. The system may include a tracking environment, comprising: one or more scene light sources, wherein the location of the scene light sources is known within said tracking environment; one or more scene detectors operable to detect light within the tracking environment, wherein the location and orientation of said one or more scene detectors is known within said tracking environment; one or more scene reflectors operable to reflect light originating from said one or more scene light sources, wherein the location of said one or more scene reflectors is known within said tracking environment; and, one or more wearable user devices comprising a curved reflective surface with known geometry; and, a computer processor operable to analyse light readings detected by said one or more scene detectors, and to calculate a position of the one or more wearable user devices.

The present invention relates to a node for use in a sensor network, e.g. for use in radar systems, using the antenna elements in each separate node as antenna elements in an array antenna configuration. The node transmits and receives signals over a first and a second communication channel having non-equal speeds of propagation. When the node identifies that a reset signal has been received over the first communication channel (S10), it adjusts the internal clock (S11), transmits an acknowledgement signal (S12) and initiates an acknowledgement process (S17). When the reset signal has not been identified, the node transmits the reset signal over the first communication channel (S13) and receives a response signal from one node (S14). If the response signal is an acknowledgement signal, an acknowledgement process is initiated (S17), or if the response signal is a non-acknowledgement signal, the internal clock is adjusted (S16) and an acknowledgement process is initiated (S17). In the acknowledgement process (S17), the node determines a distance to the other nodes by measuring the travelling time for a signal over the second communication channel (S18), exchanges distance information with the other nodes (S20), and fine tunes the internal clock of each node when transmitting over the first communication channel (S20). According to an aspect, the node's transceiver circuitry consists of a radio frequency part being able to transmit and receive electromagnetic signals and an acoustic part being able to transmit and receive acoustic signals (e.g. ultrasound). Each node determines the distance in the acknowledgement process (S17) by transmitting a signal to a specific node and receive a return signal with information regarding internal processing time in the addressed node, thereby calculating the distance based on the travelling time Furthermore, each node mutually exchanges distance information between the plurality of nodes. This results in fine tuning of the clock. Nodes that have successfully undergone fine tuning repeat the same process to nodes in their range. Repeating this process, all nodes of the radar system will have clocks ideally synchronous.

A method for detecting an object in a surrounding region of a motor vehicle is disclosed. In each of a plurality of temporally sequential measurement cycles a raw signal is received, which describes an ultrasonic signal of an ultrasonic sensor reflected in the surrounding region, the raw signal is compared with a predetermined ground threshold value curve, and a signal component of the raw signal that is to be tracked which exceeds the ground threshold value curve is detected and assigned to the object, and the object is tracked in the measurement cycles on the basis of the detected signal component that is to be tracked, wherein to track the object after recognition of the signal component that is to be tracked, in the subsequent measurement cycles, signal peaks of the raw signal are detected, and an assignment to the object is checked for the detected signal peaks.

A vehicular radar sensing system includes a radar sensor disposed at a vehicle. The radar sensor includes a plurality of antennas, which includes a plurality of transmitting antennas and a plurality of receiving antennas. The radar sensor transmits multiple outputs via the plurality of transmitting antennas and receives multiple inputs via the plurality of receiving antennas. The plurality of antennas includes a plurality of sets of antennas, each set having a V shape or an X shape, and with each of the shaped sets of antennas having an apex. A signal feed is provided to the apex of each of the shaped sets of antennas. Outputs of the receiving antennas are communicated to a processor, and the processor, responsive to the outputs of the receiving antennas, determines presence of one or more objects exterior the vehicle and within the field of sensing of the radar sensor.

A system including at least three robots. Each robot including a proximity sensor unit and an imaging device. At least one robot including a processor to perform a method of estimating a pose of a human, the method including obtaining a first pose estimate for the human, the first pose estimate based on proximity sensor information, obtaining a second pose estimate for the human, the second pose estimate based on imaging device information, and generating a refined pose estimate for the human by fusing the first pose estimate with the second pose estimate, where the first pose information provides predictive values and the second pose estimate provides correction values. The method including applying a deep neural network (DNN) human model, and applying a DNN human pose model. A method to generate a refined pose estimation for a human and a non-transitory computer readable medium are also disclosed.

A driving assistance apparatus comprising a first object detecting sensor device, a second object detecting sensor device, and a control unit. The first object detecting sensor device detects an object and obtains the position and a certainty value of the object. The second object detecting sensor device detects an object and obtains the position and an object type for the object. The control unit executes collision avoidance control to avoid collision between a vehicle and a monitoring target object which is detected by the first object detecting sensor device when the certainty value of the monitoring target object is higher than a certainty threshold. If the monitoring target object is also detected by the second object detecting sensor device and its object type is a specific type, the certainty threshold is made larger.