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Hannan Ejaz Keen

Publications and source records attributed to Hannan Ejaz Keen.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

Beyond Pixel Similarity: Task-Aware Evaluation of GAN-Based Synthetic Sonar Data for Robotic Perception

Synthetic data can reduce the cost of collecting and annotating training data for robotic perception, but generating sensor observations that preserve the characteristics relevant to downstream perception remains challenging, particularly for sonar imagery. In this work, we investigate whether conventional image-fidelity metrics adequately reflect the downstream perception performance of GAN-generated synthetic sonar data. We employ a Pix2Pix conditional generative adversarial network with four discriminator configurations characterized by different receptive fields: PixelGAN, PatchGAN-16, PatchGAN-70, and ImageGAN. The models are trained using sonar imagery from two datasets and evaluated using conventional image-fidelity metrics, including Structural Similarity Index (SSIM), Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR), and Mean Squared Error (MSE). To complement these pixel-level measures with task-oriented evaluation, YOLOX-S, YOLOX-L, and Faster R-CNN detectors are trained exclusively on real sonar imagery and subsequently evaluated on the GAN-generated images using identical test samples and annotations across all discriminator configurations. The results reveal a discrepancy between image-fidelity and downstream object-detection performance: the configuration achieving the best SSIM, PSNR, and MSE does not consistently yield the best detection performance. In particular, PatchGAN configurations achieve strong downstream detection results despite not achieving the highest pixel-level similarity scores. These findings suggest, for the datasets and models considered, pixel-level image-fidelity metrics alone may not consistently capture the task-relevant realism of synthetic sonar observations and motivate the use of task-aware evaluation for synthetic sensor data intended for robotic perception.

cs.RO↗

Towards Collaborative Joint Perception and Prediction: Framework, Baseline Evaluation, and Deployment Perspectives

Connected Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs) increasingly exploit Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) communication to exchange multi-source sensor information, enabling advanced Collaborative Perception (CP) capabilities. Extending beyond these capabilities, this work focuses on Collaborative Joint Perception and Prediction (Co-P&P), a paradigm that unifies CP with motion prediction to mitigate two persistent challenges: the accumulation of perception errors and visual occlusions. We present a conceptual framework for Collaborative Joint Perception and Prediction (Co-P&P) that improves motion prediction of surrounding road users, thereby enhancing situational awareness in complex and dynamic traffic environments. Building upon our preliminary study, this extended version compares the performance of different fusion strategies and establishes baseline performance for a modular design of perception and prediction. Experimental results show that prediction-level fusion leads to a decline in overall system performance compared to detection-level or tracking-level fusion. We further implement a minimal end-to-end Co-P&P prototype that couples collaborative point-cloud sharing via the RENO neural codec with joint detection-forecasting via FutureDet, showing that collaboration improves forecasting accuracy while neural compression preserves this benefit at roughly 34x lower communication bandwidth.

cs.CV↗

VALISENS: A Validated Innovative Multi-Sensor System for Cooperative Automated Driving

Reliable perception remains a key challenge for Connected Automated Vehicles (CAVs) in complex real-world environments, where varying lighting conditions and adverse weather degrade sensing performance. While existing multi-sensor solutions improve local robustness, they remain constrained by limited sensing range, line-of-sight occlusions, and sensor failures on individual vehicles. This paper introduces VALISENS, a validated cooperative perception system that extends multi-sensor fusion beyond a single vehicle through Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X)-enabled collaboration between Connected Automated Vehicles (CAVs) and intelligent infrastructure. VALISENS integrates onboard and roadside LiDARs, radars, RGB cameras, and thermal cameras within a unified multi-agent perception framework. Thermal cameras enhances the detection of Vulnerable Road Users (VRUs) under challenging lighting conditions, while roadside sensors reduce occlusions and expand the effective perception range. In addition, an integrated sensor monitoring module continuously assesses sensor health and detects anomalies before system degradation occurs. The proposed system is implemented and evaluated in a dedicated real-world testbed. Experimental results show that VALISENS improves pedestrian situational awareness by up to 18% compared with vehicle-only sensing, while the sensor monitoring module achieves over 97% accuracy, demonstrating its effectiveness and its potential to support future Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) applications.

cs.RO↗

Systematic Literature Review on Vehicular Collaborative Perception -- A Computer Vision Perspective

The effectiveness of autonomous vehicles relies on reliable perception capabilities. Despite significant advancements in artificial intelligence and sensor fusion technologies, current single-vehicle perception systems continue to encounter limitations, notably visual occlusions and limited long-range detection capabilities. Collaborative Perception (CP), enabled by Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) communication, has emerged as a promising solution to mitigate these issues and enhance the reliability of autonomous systems. Beyond advancements in communication, the computer vision community is increasingly focusing on improving vehicular perception through collaborative approaches. However, a systematic literature review that thoroughly examines existing work and reduces subjective bias is still lacking. Such a systematic approach helps identify research gaps, recognize common trends across studies, and inform future research directions. In response, this study follows the PRISMA 2020 guidelines and includes 106 peer-reviewed articles. These publications are analyzed based on modalities, collaboration schemes, and key perception tasks. Through a comparative analysis, this review illustrates how different methods address practical issues such as pose errors, temporal latency, communication constraints, domain shifts, heterogeneity, and adversarial attacks. Furthermore, it critically examines evaluation methodologies, highlighting a misalignment between current metrics and CP's fundamental objectives. By delving into all relevant topics in-depth, this review offers valuable insights into challenges, opportunities, and risks, serving as a reference for advancing research in vehicular collaborative perception.

cs.CV↗

R-LiViT: A LiDAR-Visual-Thermal Dataset Enabling Vulnerable Road User Focused Roadside Perception

In autonomous driving, the integration of roadside perception systems is essential for overcoming occlusion challenges and enhancing the safety of Vulnerable Road Users(VRUs). While LiDAR and visual (RGB) sensors are commonly used, thermal imaging remains underrepresented in datasets, despite its acknowledged advantages for VRU detection in extreme lighting conditions. In this paper, we present R-LiViT, the first dataset to combine LiDAR, RGB, and thermal imaging from a roadside perspective, with a strong focus on VRUs. R-LiViT captures three intersections during both day and night, ensuring a diverse dataset. It includes 10,000 LiDAR frames and 2,400 temporally and spatially aligned RGB and thermal images across 150 traffic scenarios, with 7 and 8 annotated classes respectively, providing a comprehensive resource for tasks such as object detection and tracking. The dataset and the code for reproducing our evaluation results are made publicly available.

cs.CV↗

The Components of Collaborative Joint Perception and Prediction -- A Conceptual Framework

Connected Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs) benefit from Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) communication, which enables the exchange of sensor data to achieve Collaborative Perception (CP). To reduce cumulative errors in perception modules and mitigate the visual occlusion, this paper introduces a new task, Collaborative Joint Perception and Prediction (Co-P&P), and provides a conceptual framework for its implementation to improve motion prediction of surrounding objects, thereby enhancing vehicle awareness in complex traffic scenarios. The framework consists of two decoupled core modules, Collaborative Scene Completion (CSC) and Joint Perception and Prediction (P&P) module, which simplify practical deployment and enhance scalability. Additionally, we outline the challenges in Co-P&P and discuss future directions for this research area.

cs.CV↗