An Improved Model Predictive Control-Based Trajectory Planning Method for Automated Driving Vehicles Under Uncertainty Environments

For automated driving vehicles, trajectory planning is responsible for obtaining feasible trajectories with velocity profiles according to driving environments. From the perspective of trajectory planning, multiple uncertainties of environments and tracking deviations are two significant factors affecting driving safety. The former disturbs the judgment of trajectory planning on the environments, and the latter reduces the tracking accuracy of planned trajectories. To solve these problems, an improved model predictive control (MPC) trajectory planning method is proposed in this paper. Firstly, a Kalman filter fusion method is carried out to predict obstacle trajectory and their uncertainty, which combines model-based and data-based prediction methods. Based on the prediction results, a tube-based MPC trajectory planning method is applied to plan a reference trajectory with a small tracking deviation. The tube-based MPC is composed of two parts. One is the MPC with tightened constraints that is used to plan a feasible trajectory according to a nominal vehicle system and driving environment. The other is a state feedback control that is proposed to adjust the above planned trajectory to reduce the tracking deviations. To our knowledge, this paper proposes Kalman filter fusion and tube-based MPC planning method for the first time to consider the uncertainties of trajectory prediction and tracking control meanwhile in the planning. The planning method is verified by simulations and experiments in multiple scenes. Results show that the method is suitable for both static and dynamic scenes. Compared with applying the basic prediction method, the lateral deviation of the proposed method from the ideal trajectory is decreased by 46.5%. Compared with the nominal MPC method, the lateral tracking deviations of the proposed method are decreased by 77.42%.