Luminar, LLC

A lidar system is disclosed. The system comprises a light source configured to emit light pulses. The system comprises a scanner configured to scan the emitted light pulses across an internal reference target internal to the system. The system comprises a detector configured to detect light that is at least a portion of light scattered by the internal reference target from at least a portion of the emitted light pulses. The system comprises a processor configured to selectively gather detected optical property values of the detected light corresponding to a selective portion of the emitted light pulses scanned across the internal reference target and use the selectively gathered detected optical property values to determine one or more calibration values.

In one embodiment, a lidar system includes a light source configured to emit local-oscillator (LO) light and pulses of light, the emitted pulses of light including a first emitted pulse of light, where an optical frequency of the first emitted pulse of light is offset from an optical frequency of the LO light by a first frequency offset. The lidar system further includes a receiver configured to detect the LO light and a first received pulse of light, the first received pulse of light including light from the first emitted pulse of light scattered by a target located a distance from the lidar system. The receiver includes a detector, where: the LO light and the first received pulse of light are coherently mixed together at the detector, and the detector is configured to produce a photocurrent signal corresponding to the coherent mixing.

A system and method are described for assessing accuracy of a virtual horizon generated by a vehicle-based lidar system as the vehicle traverses a route of travel. Travel route topology data is obtained by a vehicle vehicle-mounted global positioning system-assisted inertial measurement unit (GPS/IMU) data. A reference virtual horizon at points along the route of travel is obtained from the GPS/IMU data and is compared with the virtual horizon generated by the lidar system for the same points to assess the accuracy of the virtual horizon generated by the lidar system.

A system includes a laser diode configured to produce seed light, a capacitor configured to charge from a voltage source, a transistor configured to control current flowing through a semiconductor optical amplifier via a controlled discharge of the capacitor, the semiconductor optical amplifier configured to amplify at least a temporal portion of the seed light in response to the current flowing through the semiconductor optical amplifier to emit an output pulse of light, and a receiver configured to detect at least a portion of the output pulse of light scattered by a target object located at a distance from the system.

In one embodiment, a lidar system includes a light source configured to emit local-oscillator (LO) light and pulses of light, the emitted pulses of light including a first emitted pulse of light, where an optical frequency of the first emitted pulse of light is offset from an optical frequency of the LO light by a first frequency offset. The lidar system further includes a receiver configured to detect the LO light and a first received pulse of light, the first received pulse of light including light from the first emitted pulse of light scattered by a target located a distance from the lidar system. The receiver includes a detector, where: the LO light and the first received pulse of light are coherently mixed together at the detector, and the detector is configured to produce a photocurrent signal corresponding to the coherent mixing.

A system includes an electronic circuit configured to provide a detected waveform including a first detected waveform portion corresponding to a first output light pulse triggered at a first trigger time and a second detected waveform portion corresponding to a second output light pulse triggered at a second trigger time. The system further includes one or more processors configured to determine a pulse metric associated with the second output light pulse including by being configured to determine a difference between a measured level on the second detected waveform portion and a modeled reference level determined based on a signal decay model and a measured pulse period.

In one embodiment, a lidar system includes a wavelength-tunable light source configured to emit pulses of light, each emitted pulse of light having a particular wavelength of multiple different wavelengths. The lidar system also includes a scanner configured to scan the emitted pulses of light across a field of regard of the lidar system. The scanner includes (i) a beam deflector configured to angularly deflect each emitted pulse of light along a first scan axis according to the particular wavelength of the emitted pulse of light and (ii) a scan mirror configured to scan the emitted pulses of light along a second scan axis different from the first scan axis. The lidar system further includes a receiver configured to detect a received pulse of light that includes a portion of one of the emitted pulses of light scattered by a target located a distance from the lidar system.

A system comprises a wavelength-tunable light source and a controller. The controller is configured to cause attenuation of a light being generated by the wavelength-tunable light source during a transition period between a first wavelength to a second wavelength, cause the wavelength-tunable light source to change a wavelength of the light being generated by the wavelength-tunable light source from the first wavelength to the second wavelength, and allow a pulse of the light associated with the second wavelength to be emitted during a pulse period after the transition period.

A lidar system comprises one or more light sources, detectors, and processors. The light sources transmit pulse groups where each pulse group can include a light pulse in a first wavelength and a light pulse in a second wavelength with an encoding time delay between the pulses. A first transmit pulse group uses a first encoding time delay and a second transmit pulse group uses a second encoding time delay. The first and second encoding time delays are included in a history of transmitted encoding time delays. The detectors detect received light pulses in the first and second wavelengths. The processors perform correlations between a detected timing between a pair of received pulses and one or more encoding time delays to identify which transmit pulse group among candidate transmit pulse groups including the first and second transmit pulse groups corresponds to the pair of received pulses.

A system for detecting boundaries of lanes on a road is presented. The system includes an imaging system configured to produce a set of pixels associated with lane markings on a road. The system also includes one or more processors configured to detect boundaries of lanes on the road, including: receive, from the imaging system, the set of pixels associated with lane markings; partition the set of pixels into a plurality of groups, each of the plurality of groups associated with one or more control points; and generate a first spline that traverses the control points of the plurality of groups, the first spline describing a boundary of a lane on the road.