A Novel Graph and Safety Potential Field Theory-Based Vehicle Platoon Formation and Optimization Method

Linheng Li,Jing Gan,Xu Qu,Ziwei Yi,Bin Ran,Peipei Mao

doi:10.3390/app11030958

Abstract

Platooning is considered to be a very effective method for improving traffic efficiency, traffic safety and fuel economy under the connected and automated environment. The prerequisite for realizing these advantages is how to form a platoon without any collisions and how to maintain and optimize the car-following behavior after platoon formation. However, most of the existing studies focus on the platoon configuration and information transmission method, while only a few attempt to address the issue of platoon formation and optimization methods. To this end, this study proposes a novel platoon formation and optimization model combining graph theory and safety potential field (G-SPF) theory for connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) under different vehicle distributions. Compared to previous studies, we innovatively incorporate the concept of the safety potential field to better describe the actual driving risk of vehicles and ensure their absolute safety. A four-step platoon formation and optimization strategy is developed to achieve platoon preliminary formation and platoon driving optimization control. Three traffic scenarios with different CAVs distributions are designed to verify the effectiveness of our proposed platoon formation method based on G-SPF theory, and the simulation results indicate that a collision-free platoon can be formed in a short time. Additionally, the G-SPF-based platoon driving optimization control method is demonstrated by comparing it with two typical control strategies. Compared with the constant spacing and constant time headway control strategies, the simulation results show that our proposed method can improve the traffic capacity by approximately 48.8% and 26.6%, respectively.

Highlights

The advancement in vehicular and communication technology facilitates vehicles to organize into a group of units with small inter-vehicle spacing commonly known as a vehicular platoon
We developed a platoon formation control model and a platoon optimization control model based on graph theory and safety potential field theory, and more details are discussed
This study proposes a novel graph and safety potential field theory-based platoon formation and optimization method

Summary

Introduction

The advancement in vehicular and communication technology facilitates vehicles to organize into a group of units with small inter-vehicle spacing commonly known as a vehicular platoon. In the connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) environment, the vehicle platoon is considered as a promising solution for enhancing road safety, improving road traffic efficiency and reducing fuel consumption in recent studies [1,2,3,4,5]. With the increase in the market penetration of CAVs, the research on the formation method and driving optimization of vehicle platoons will continue to be a research hotspot. In the actual traffic system, the different intelligence levels of vehicles and the topological structure of the information flow between vehicles are very important factors that affect the formation of the platoons. It is necessary to comprehensively consider the actual road environment information (e.g., vehicle information, road information) in the formation process of the platoon. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effectiveness potential of vehicle platoon formation using graph and safety potential field theories, along with a driving optimization control strategy on the basis of safety potential field theory

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Conclusion