Multifunctional Sensor to Detect Environmental Parameters

Abstract

The SIRPA project aims at developing a multifunction automotive sensor with the integration, on a single CMOS array, of several sensing functions presently provided by different sensors. Such multifunctional sensor will be used to detect a number of critical environmental parameters, such as the luminance of the background and the visibility (in the presence of fog, rain and windshield dimming), while providing additional information about the driving scenario (e.g. curvature of the road, oncoming vehicles, approaching tunnels, ...). The project was launched by Centro Ricerche Fiat and involves Neuricam, ITC-IRST and University of Trento. The sensor is meant to provide some of the required input data for the automatic control of the adaptive headlamp system developed by CRF. In this system the headlamp beams can be modified according to the particular driving and environmental conditions. The prospect of integrating several functions into a single optical CMOS required redesigning existing functions and developing new ones (fog detection). The approach here used was to develop and validate the individual functions separately and afterwards to integrate them onto a CMOS array.