Mitsubishi Electric Ground-Illumination & Smart-Control AI

Mitsubishi Electric Corporation announced two new systems .There will offer  a new automotive indicator system that projects animated illuminations on road surfaces around the vehicle, which can change in response to approaching passersby, to realize highly intuitive, easy-to-see warnings about the vehicle’s intended movements for enhanced road safety. The company has developed a smart-control artificial-intelligence (AI) technology under its Maisart AI brand that enables devices such as industrial robots to rapidly grasp and nimbly adapt in real time to changing conditions of target objects. .

Road Illuminations

The road-projected illuminations effectively warn others about the vehicle’s movements and actions even in bad weather. The illuminations’ animation patterns change when various sensors in the vehicle detect changes in the area around the vehicle, such as an approaching pedestrian. The system also uses interior illuminations to keep the driver well informed about the area around the vehicle.

The new system includes a development and evaluation tool that manufacturers can use to check illumination patterns before installing the system in vehicles.

Illuminated indicators for intuitive communication with other vehicles and pedestrians offer important advantages for automotive safety. Since the movements and actions of future autonomous vehicles could be difficult to interpret, these vehicles will require extra-intuitive illuminated indicators to communicate effectively with other drivers and pedestrians. Also, according to research conducted in 2016 by the Institute for Traffic Accident Research and Data Analysis, about 60 percent of pedestrian fatalities on roads occur at night, so illuminated projections that are clearly visible in the dark are expected to help reduce such fatalities.

Mitsubishi Electric will continue refining its technologies for enhanced automotive safety and accident prevention.

Main Features of AI

The application of this AI technology in devices will simplify automation tasks, even in the case of dramatically changing conditions, such as adapting to the changing shape of a non-rigid object.

1)	Uses AI technology and multiple sensors to grasp changes in objects in real time The technology grasps the state of an object via multiple sensors and then recognizes any change by applying the company’s Maisart-brand smart-learning AI. Through repeated estimation based on deep learning, tests have shown that the technology can decrease learning time and grasp changes in conditions in just 3.5ms
2)	Technology redesigns control algorithms autonomously in real time The automatic generation of optimal control algorithms through deep reinforcement-learning frees designers from having to redesign complex control algorithms. Application of this technology in industrial robots, etc. makes it possible for such devices to adapt to objects that are conventionally difficult to adapt to, such as flexible objects that change shape or objects for which conditions can change dramatically.