Stability Analysis of Following Vehicles on a Highway for Safety　of Automated Transportation Systems

摘要

The development and integration of advanced control technologies in vehicles and infrastructure can make intelligent (or automated)transportation systems much more safe and efficient. This paper focuses on a proper approach to stability and control of two adjacentvehicles following each other on the same traffic lane of a highway to ensure the functional safety of their automated drivingsystems. These vehicles are as entirely automated as they have the ability to follow a line path at a high speed and reduce the distancethat separates them while adjusting their dynamic responses automatically without intervention from humans (i.e. drivers). To meetrequirements for driving safety and stability, this paper explores a new approach to string stability of (any) two adjacent vehiclestraveling in the same direction based on using optimal control and Lyapunov stability theories. Therefore, sufficient conditions forstring stability of a vehicle traffic using continuous-time Lyapunov function and matrix Riccati equation are presented. The searchfor a quadratic Lyapunov function is formulated as a convex optimization problem in terms of a linear invariant system towards aquadratic optimal criterion. The analysis of these methods for minimizing the desired performance criteria is also given. Finally, thepaper ends with a conclusion and perspective for future work.