The present disclosure provides a photosensor structure including a left photosensor located at the left side of a front windshield of a vehicle viewed from the outside of the vehicle, and a right photosensor located symmetrically to the left photosensor. For example, the left photosensor includes two light reception windows located in a width direction of the vehicle to set a lateral incidence angle having a maximum incidence amount in a left-and-right direction of a light source, a dummy portion located on at least one of the two light reception windows between the two light reception windows to set an incidence altitude having a maximum incidence amount in an upward-and-downward direction of the light source, and light reception units located on lower ends of the light reception windows to measure the amount of light received from the light source through the light reception windows.

Sun load on a cabin of a vehicle is determined without a sun load sensor by affixing a relative humidity/temperature sensor to an inside of a windshield of the vehicle. The relative humidity/temperature sensor includes a relative humidity sensor that senses relative humidity of air at the relative humidity sensor, a temperature sensor that senses temperature of the air at the relative humidity sensor and a glass temperature sensor that senses temperature of glass of the windshield. A controller determines the sun load based on readings from the relative humidity/temperature sensor of relative humidity of the air at the relative humidity sensor, temperature of the air at the relative humidity sensor and temperature of the glass of the windshield.

A method for controlling a heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) system of an autonomous vehicle includes determining a vehicle operating status and operating the HVAC system according to the determined vehicle operating status. A control module comprising a sensor array and at least one controller operatively coupled to the sensor array and to the HVAC system controls operation of the HVAC system according to the determined vehicle operating status. The vehicle operating status is selected from one of vehicle occupied-in use, vehicle unoccupied-use requested, and vehicle unoccupied-standby. The HVAC system is operated at an operating setting providing a reduced energy consumption in a vehicle whose operating status is vehicle unoccupied-standby. The reduced energy consumption operating setting is determined according to a constant offset value or according to a variable offset value determined by inputs provided by the sensor array.

A parking device mountable on a vehicle and capable of parking autonomously includes an autonomous-parking-command receiver, a vehicle-occupant detector, and a determination unit. The autonomous-parking-command receiver receives a parking command given by a user to park the vehicle. The vehicle-occupant detector detects whether a vehicle occupant is in the vehicle. The determination unit determines whether to permit the vehicle to park. In a case where the autonomous-parking-command receiver receives the parking command and the vehicle-occupant detector does not detect the vehicle occupant, the determination unit determines permits parking and allows the vehicle to park autonomously. In a case where the autonomous-parking-command receiver receives the parking command and the vehicle-occupant detector detects the vehicle occupant, the determination unit does not permit parking and forbids the vehicle to park autonomously by commanding the autonomous-parking-command receiver to cancel the reception of the parking command.

A multi-zone air conditioner system for large vehicles may include an air conditioning device configured to partition an internal of a vehicle into a plurality of zones to independently cool each zone, a detecting device configured to include a room temperature detector for detecting a room temperature of each zone and a photo detector for detecting an amount of solar radiation, an input device configured to switch an operating state of the air conditioning device to an automatic mode or a manual mode, and a control device configured to generate a control signal for operating the air conditioning device based on a signal transmitted from the detecting device and the input device.

A vehicle detector assembly for detecting solar radiation may include a housing, a fixed plate fixed to an upper surface of the housing in a flat form, a plurality of photo detectors bonded to a surface of the fixed plate, each being connected to a lead having a uniform one-directional inclination structure, and a detector cap fastened to the housing and transmitting sunlight.

The invention relates to a device (50) for analysing infrared radiation emitted or reflected by at least one surface (21) of a motor vehicle (1) passenger compartment (7), characterised in that said device comprises at least one infrared camera (51) arranged and oriented such as to measure at least part of the infrared radiation emitted or reflected by the at least one surface (21) of the passenger compartment (7).

The invention relates to a device for operating an air conditioning system (12) of a vehicle. The air conditioning system has a fan, a plurality of actuating motors for controlling flaps on and/or in air-conducting channels, a heating and/or a cooling unit, and a plurality of sensors (28, 30) for sensing measurement variables required for the operation of the heating, ventilation and/or air conditioning system. The sensors (28, 30) include an interior temperature sensor (26). The device has an operating and control unit (32) for inputting a desired temperature and for outputting air conditioning control signals for the control of components of the air conditioning system. The device also has a processing unit (40), which is arranged outside of and/or separate from the operating and control unit (32) and to which measurement signals from the interior temperature sensor (26) and from at least some of the other sensors (28, 30) of the air conditioning system can be supplied and which processes said measurement signals further to form air conditioning control signals.

A system and method are disclosed for a vehicle that comprises one or more sensors configured to obtain information indicating a physical state of a baby. A wireless transceiver may be included and in communication with a mobile device. The transceiver may be configured to connect mobile device with a camera configured to monitor the baby. A controller may also be in communication with the one or more sensors and the wireless transceiver. The controller may be configured to determine the physical state of the baby utilizing the information obtained from the one or more sensors. The controller may also be configured activate one or more vehicle systems in response to the physical state of the baby and to output on a vehicle display or the mobile device a notification to a user indicating the physical state of the baby.

A method for setting a thermal comfort state of at least one user of a vehicle, wherein, at a starting time, at least one actual state variable of the user is detected by at least one device for detecting the at least one state variable and a starting comfort state of the user is determined depending on the at least one actual state variable, wherein a target comfort state is determined, wherein at least one target state variable is determined depending on the target comfort state, wherein at least one vehicle-end device for changing the state variable is controlled so that a deviation in the actual state variable from the target state variable is minimized when the target comfort state deviates from the starting comfort state, wherein the at least one state variable is detected by a device carried by the user for detecting the at least one state variable.