Handling inevitable collision states by Advanced Driver Assistance Systems functions: software-in-the-loop performance assessment of an injury risk-based logic in a “lane departure” scenario

The downward trend in the number of fatalities and serious injuries related to road accidents depends on the implementation of increasingly performing Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) in the circulating fleet. The greatest benefit of the adoption of ADASs like Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) consists in limiting the frequency of impacts. However, in Inevitable Collision States (ICSs), the decrease in impact closing speed guaranteed by the AEB may not reduce the Injury Risk (IR) for the occupants: IR is a function of the vehicle’s velocity change in the collision ($\Delta V$) – a combination of impact closing speed and impact eccentricity. The work virtually analyses, in lane departure ICS scenarios, the performance of an adaptive steering and braking intervention logic based on instantaneous IR minimization. The adaptive logic reduces IR compared to the absence of intervention (down to 80 times lower) and to the AEB (down to 40 times lower) by leading the ego vehicle toward eccentric impact configurations. It is highlighted that full activation of the steer-by-wire system in 0.3 s allows the adaptive logic to also reduce the frequency of impacts; it is further evidenced that employing a function capable of modulating the braking level to minimize IR entails disadvantages from the IR perspective compared to the AEB: efficient intervention strategies on the steering are the only alternative for increasing the safety provided by high-performance ADASs. Finally, compared to previous literature, the study highlights high efficiencies of the adaptive logic in a wide range of ICS scenarios.