US 5,845,000 · Granted 1998-12-01
The Infrared Eye That Stops Airbags From Hurting You
Imagine a camera inside your car that can see in infrared (heat vision) and uses AI to figure out where you're sitting. If you're too close to an airbag or in the wrong position, it tells the airbag not to deploy, so you don't get hurt instead of helped.
The plain-English version
What it protects
The claim covers a vehicle safety system that uses infrared cameras and pattern-recognition software to detect occupant position and location inside a passenger compartment, then automatically disables airbag deployment based on where that occupant is sitting. What's protected here is the specific combination of thermal imaging sensors, computational analysis of occupant geometry, and the logic that links detection directly to airbag suppression.
Why it matters
This patent addresses a real and serious problem: airbags save lives in crashes, but they can injure or kill occupants who are too close, sitting sideways, or in unexpected positions. By automating the decision to deploy or suppress an airbag based on actual occupant location rather than seat sensors alone, this technology made cars safer for more people. It became foundational for modern occupant-sensing systems that are now standard in vehicles worldwide.
Real-world use
Every time a car with modern occupant-detection airbag systems passes a crash test or gets in a real accident, this technology is working behind the scenes to decide whether that airbag should fire.
Original USPTO abstract
A vehicle interior monitoring system to identify, locate and monitor occupants, including their parts, and other objects in the passenger compartment and objects outside of a motor vehicle, such as an automobile or truck, by illuminating the contents of the vehicle and objects outside of the vehicle with electromagnetic, and specifically infrared, radiation and using one or more lenses to focus images of the contents onto one or more arrays of charge coupled devices (CCD arrays). Outputs from the CCD arrays, are analyzed by appropriate computational means employing trained pattern recognition technologies, to classify, identify or locate the contents or external objects. In general, the information obtained by the identification and monitoring system is used to affect the operation of some other system in the vehicle. When system is installed in the passenger compartment of an automotive vehicle equipped with an airbag, the system determines the position of the vehicle occupant relative to the airbag and disables deployment of the airbag if the occupant is positioned so that he/she is likely to be injured by the deployment of the airbag.
Patent details
- Publication number
- US 5,845,000
- Filing date
- 1995-06-07
- Grant date
- 1998-12-01
- Assignee
- Automotive Technologies International, Inc.
- Inventor(s)
- BREED; DAVID S., DUVALL; WILBUR E., JOHNSON; WENDELL C.
- CPC class
- B60R21/0134
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