Automatic emergency braking: how can affordable thermal camera improve reliability and extend use cases to nighttime conditions

Road fatalities that represent 1.3 million death each year is the 8th cause of decease in the world, 54% of them are Vulnerable Road Users. In the United States or Europe, 75% of fatalities happen in poor visibility conditions.

Active safety is a promising way to reduce road fatalities with features like Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB). Currently, it relies mainly on RGB camera and radar that suffer from limitations in challenging situations that represents the majority of accident situations. These challenging situations include nighttime, headlamp or sun glare, rain and fog. NHTSA latest rulemaking proposition requires AEB systems that work during day and nighttime conditions for pedestrian and car detection. Thermal imaging is a complementary technology to visible cameras and radars to extend AEB use cases to these challenging situations.

After defining the requested Recognition range for pedestrians related to NHTSA rulemaking proposition requirements, the paper will explore thermal imaging capabilities for pedestrian detection in daytime and nighttime conditions compared to a commercial vehicule visible system. Impact of pixel pitch on pedestrian Recognition range performance is presented. Finally, a $100 thermal camera configuration that covers the NHTSA rulemaking proposition requirements is described.